


take my heart from me

by Areiton



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Derek, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Derek Hale is Bad at Feelings, First Kiss, Getting Together, Hurt Stiles, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Cheating, M/M, Misunderstandings, POV Multiple, Pack Feels, Past Rape/Non-con, Post-Season/Series 02, Sheriff Stilinski Finds Out, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-07
Updated: 2019-02-09
Packaged: 2019-08-20 08:43:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 23,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16552592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Areiton/pseuds/Areiton
Summary: He didn't really mean to adopt Derek's pack of puppies. He didn't mean to make himself important to them.To Derek.He just wanted to keep them all safe.That's all Stiles ever wanted.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Remember when I said I'd write for sharing the AO3 Donation drive? This is that.   
> If you don't remember, just enjoy.
> 
> Plan is to update every other day! But you know what they say about plans...

**Stiles and Puppies**

Stiles vanishes as soon as the dust settles, vibrating with an urgency that he thinks the pack would notice, if they were in any position to notice anything. 

As it is, they’re all absorbed in their own shit and he’s able to limp away undisturbed. 

He goes back to the Argent house, and they aren’t  _ there  _ and for about five minutes, he panics, a deep seated terror because what if they’re dead, what if Gerard and his bastard hunters actually killed them--

He gets half way home when he sees the blonde head bent toward a black leather clad shoulder, and he swerves to the side, spilling out of the jeep to land on his knees next to them. 

Erica blinks at him through her hair, bloody and matted, her lips and skin raw from the tape. She moves  _ gingerly _ like she can’t quite believe that she  _ can _ move, and Stiles sighs. “Come on, honey. Let’s get home, ok?” 

Boyd watches, not bothering to move until Erica is tucked into the Jeep and Stiles comes back, and pulls him. 

When they’re tucked inside and the door is shut, Stiles lets out a shuddery breath. For the first time since he got dragged from the basement, Stiles feels like maybe they’re going to be ok. 

~*~ 

He takes them home and his dad gives him a searching sort of look, but Stiles shakes his head and shoves Erica and Boyd almost bodily into a shower, giving them soft clothes--his for Erica and she still swims in them--and a pair of sweats and tshirt he stole from his dad for Boyd. 

The beta makes a face at the scent, but Stiles brushes a hand over his neck and some of the tension rolls out of him. 

“Food?” he asks and Erica makes a quietly dismissive noise. “C’mon, I know you’re hungry, you’re burning through energy right now.” 

Boyd nudges Erica to the table and she glares as Stiles puts a bowl of vegetable beef soup in front of them both, before scurrying back to the stove to finish the grilled cheese. 

They eat quietly, but eventually the food runs out, and Erica looks at him. 

“Now what?” she asks, lowly. 

Stiles blinks at her and Boyd makes an impatient noise. “Are you going to call Derek?” 

“Uh. No? I was--gonna get some blankets and pillows and have a sleepover on the pullout? I don’t really want to sleep alone.” 

Erica blinks, and relief slips over Boyd’s face, there and gone so fast he doesn’t think it’s real. 

“What about--” 

“We’ll worry about that tomorrow. Tonight--sleep. The only thing I want you to worry about is, do we watch Mulan or Beauty and the Beast first?” 

Erica snorts and carries her dishes to the sink, “Aladin. Duh.” 

Stiles grins, and it feels real, almost. 

~*~ 

They fall asleep in a tangle of limbs on the floor, Erica’s head tucked into the crook of Boyd’s throat, and it’s so damn  _ cute _ Stiles fights to keep from cooing. 

He knows he needs to talk to Derek, needs to tell him the betas are with him, and safe. 

Except--

They trust him. 

They trust  _ him _ and after the night in the basement, when he was so sure they were all going to die--he doesn’t want to betray that trust. 

He wiggles away from Erica and glares at his phone for a long time. 

“Call him,” Boyd murmurs, and it’s low, low enough that he doesn’t wake Erica. His eyes are dark, shadowed and afraid. “If he wants us gone, I want to know before she goes back to him.” 

“Boyd,” Stiles whispers, and the other boy blinks hard. 

“I won’t watch her get hurt again, Stiles. I won’t. Just--call him.” 

Stiles sighs, and rolls carefully to his feet and dials. 

It rings five times before Derek answers, his voice tired and it hits Stiles suddenly, what Derek went through tonight. 

What Scott did to him. 

“Stiles.” 

“Hey--uh. We need to talk, big guy.” 

There’s a long sigh, and then, “It can wait until--” 

“I know where the betas are,” Stiles blurts out and there’s a sharp silence across the line. 

“Are they--are they  _ safe?” _ his voice is tight, that viciously controlled tone Stiles knows too well and Stiles closes his eyes. 

“Do you care?” he murmurs. He can feel Boyd watching him and refuses to look over. 

It’s  _ Derek _ and he would do a lot to keep Derek safe, to keep him happy--but Derek hadn’t been in that basement, hadn’t fought Gerard and the other hunters to keep them from hitting him, hadn’t mouthed off to distract them from the betas. 

It had been Boyd and Erica and Stiles down there, and some things-Derek can’t touch. 

“Of  _ course _ .” 

“You let them leave,” Stiles snaps, furious suddenly. “You  _ let _ them.” 

“Stiles--” 

“You’re their Alpha. You can’t--you can’t be a self sacrificial asshole who pushes people away when they get too close, Derek. We deserve better.” 

Boyd makes a low noise and then. “We?” Derek murmurs. 

“We,” Stiles snarls. “You gotta problem with that?” 

“I would never have a problem with you in my pack,” Derek answers, too earnest to dismiss. 

He looks at Boyd, and the other man stares at him. Patient. Trusting. 

“Come over in the morning,” he says. “And bring food. We’ll talk about what  _ has  _ to change.”

 

**i. Together**

 

It's not what he thinks it will be. Sometimes, lying in Derek's bed, his hand possessive on his hip, he thinks about that. 

He always imagined it would be rough--biting kisses and angry words and...hard. 

He thought it would be as painful as it was good. 

He was wrong. 

~*~ 

Derek kisses him and every time he does, Stiles thinks--this time. 

He won't kiss me that way this time. 

And every time--he does. 

Derek kisses him like he's  _ essential _ . Like Stiles is  _ everything _ . Sometimes, when he presses Stiles into the fridge and the handle digs into his back, its hard and desperate, sharp teeth nipping.  Sometimes, when Stiles is sprawled in his lap, a movie forgotten on the TV, the kisses are honey sweet and molasses slow, sliding through him so thick and  _ good _ he thinks he could come, just from this. 

 

**iii. Apart**

 

He wakes up slowly. It's the noise that wakes him--a thin whistle. 

He remembers once, when he was six or seven, his dad took him ice fishing up in Utah with a couple of the other deputies and their kids. The kids were shitty and it was freezing but for four days, he got his dad, without work or school or anything else. 

He loved that trip. But there was a broken window, in their room, and late at night, when Stiles was snuggled into bed and piled with four blankets and his dad was quietly snoring, he'd lay awake and listen to the sound of that tiny whistle, the way it  _ sounded  _ cold. 

It sounds like that, now, a kind of bone deep cold that makes him shiver. 

He hangs now in an empty room, his toes brushing the cold stone and his wrists dripping hot blood down his cold skin, while the wind whistles its icy presence along the cracked window. 

He hurts and he is cold and so very alone. 

He closes his eyes and breathes and thinks,  _ thank gods. _


	2. Chapter 2

**Adjusting**

He didn’t expect Stiles to stay.

But then, he didn’t expect Stiles to call with his lost betas, or for Scott to betray him. He didn’t expect Kate to burn them--he thinks maybe it’s time to lay his pretty expectations to rest.

Because--Stiles is. He’s human, and fragile, and there is no reason for him to be part of the pack. After that first morning, where he glared at Derek over a cup of coffee while Erica and Boyd watched anxious from the kitchen--after that, there was no reason to stay.

It's not because of Scott, is the thing.

He thought that--at first. That Stiles was only staying because of what Derek could teach Scott, and that bothered him, sat like a splinter under his skin, something he worried at and tried to get out but _couldn't_.

But as the days wear on, and summer turns--he realizes that Stiles never smells like Scott anymore. He smells like soap and sweat, like the betas and gunpowder and sometimes lube, but never Scott, and he doesn't--Derek doesn't understand.

"He doesn't have to be here," Derek mumbles, and Peter flicks a curious look at him.

"Nephew. He is by far the most interesting of your motley crew. Don't chase him away."

Derek scowls at Peter, but doesn't disagree--he can't.

Stiles is fascinating and mystifying and stubbornly--still here.

~*~

Erica and Boyd don't talk about that night, when they left and came back with Stiles.

They don't talk about where Stiles' bruises came from or the reek of terror on Erica, or the way Boyd refuses to be further than a room away from one of them.

And for all that he can normally not get Stiles to shut up--on this, Stiles won't speak at all.

"It's over, Derek," Stiles says, the one time Derek slips into his room and asks about it. "It's happened and now it's over and we have to get past it. Let us do that, the way we know how, ok?"

"I'm--they're hurting. _You're_ hurting, and I can't help. I'm their _Alpha_ , and I can't take care of them."

Stiles smiles at him, and it's tinged with sadness he doesn't recognize on the sarcastic laughing boy. "Some things you can't fix, Derek."

~*~

They don't talk about it--but sometimes. Sometimes Erica will slip into the train car and press against him on the dirty mattress, and he'll hold onto her, tears soaking her hair and his thin shirt, until she falls asleep, exhausted and finally still.

Once, Stiles comes in and finds them like that, and his eyes are wide and wild and afraid until he sees them, sees Erica sleeping there, her hands clenched in Derek's tshirt, and all the tension bleeds out of his shoulders.

He smiles at Derek then, and it makes something in him ache to see that smile.

Because for a moment, under that tired but pleased little smile, Derek thinks that maybe he can do this.

Maybe he can be the alpha his pack desperately needs.

Maybe he can be the alpha Stiles wants.

~*~

“I don’t know where I went wrong” Derek murmurs.

Stiles is sitting on the rusty seat elbows braced on his knees, and he looks at Derek, his eyes bright and warm with understanding. Derek remembers suddenly something Laura said--that alphas have to be strong.

That they didn't have room for weakness.

Even when they didn't _know_ , they had to.

Stiles is staring at him, his weakest _human_ pack member and he knows better  than to admit this.

"They don't trust me," he says. "Today was a fucking disaster--you saw it."

"It's the first time we trained," Stiles says.

Derek gives him a flat look, remembering the way Stiles had glared at him across the kitchen table, the way he'd demanded pack bonding  and training sessions. When he'd stared at Derek, and growled, _we're going to do it_ right.

The problem is--he has no idea how to do it right.

"No one expects you to be perfect, Derek."

"I have to be," Derek says, and he's tired. God he's so _tired_. "That's what an alpha is--perfect. Strong. I want them to follow me, but I haven't given them anything worth following."

There's a beat of silence, and then, "You really believe that, don't you?"

Derek doesn't answer. There's nothing he can say, really. Nothing that won't upset Stiles.

He isn't sure when upsetting Stiles became something he worried over--but it is.

"Derek, alphas build their pack because they're stronger, right--the bigger the pack, the stronger everyone is. But you--you didn't pick strong people to bite."

Derek looks at him, and Stiles shakes his head. "You picked a boy who was being abused. A girl whose disease was killing her. A guy desperate for family, so alone he was almost invisible. You picked people who _needed_ a pack. Not people who could _help_ you."

Derek looks away.

"Derek, you built a family. A pack like the one you grew up with. There's nothing wrong with that," Stiles says, gently.

"They left me. Whatever the fuck I was trying to do, it didn't work."

"You built a family, and then you treated them like soldiers," Stiles says, and a little bit of exasperation is leaking into his voice now. "You didn't--who you Bit isn't how you fucked up, Der. It's how you treated them, after."

He flinches and looks away. Swallows all the protests building on his lips.

"You were trying to protect them. I know that, and Der-- _they_ know that. But look. Right now? When we aren't fighting some geriatric bastard or a psychotic Alpha--now is when we get to breath."

Derek looks up and Stiles smiles at him, and it's full of promise and hope. "What do we do?"

"We do something different," Stiles says, easily, knocking his foot into Derek's shin. "And you move out of this hellhole into a real house.

 

**ii. Together**

 

He’s seduced without even knowing it.

It's how Stiles shoves his way into the pack, not ever questioning his welcome. It's the way he is still gentle with Erica, and the way he bounds into the house, babbling about training and research and building alliances.

It's the way he is so fucking fearless, defiant and brash even when his heart is pounding uneven in his chest, even when Isaac presses him into the wall and snarls about loyalty.

Stiles stabs him in the gut for that, pins him to the ground and spits, “My problems with Scott are just that. _Mine._ Stay the fuck out of it.”

Derek drags Stiles away before he can do any lasting damage to the beta, and tries not to think about how incredibly _hot_ it was, seeing his weak, human Stiles fighting a fucking werewolf.

He thinks, maybe.

Maybe.

~*~

The first time Derek fucks Stiles--everything changes.

He wonders, after, if Stiles even realizes it.

If the way he’d kissed Derek. The way he sprawled, boneless and pliant, on his bed, skin red and marked from Derek’s hands gripping too tight--the way he’d gasped when Derek took him in his mouth, sucking him through his first orgasm while Stiles made tiny punched out sounds--if that was _normal._

It wasn’t, not for Derek. The way he’d caressed Stiles, whispered soft praise and dirty filth--none of it was normal. The way his heart pounded, uneven and desperate when he pushed into the boy--it wasn’t _normal._

He fucks Stiles like he wants to _keep_ him, like Stiles rolling into each thrust, his nails raking over Derek’s back, heels digging into Derek’s ass is _everything_.

He fucks Stiles, and it isn’t after anything life threatening--it’s after he laughs at Isaac during training, scent marking him before they disperse, sending him on his way with a book on their summer reading list.

It’s just _that_ , digging under his skin, and them, stumbling into his bed, and this, this infuriatingly beautiful, impossible boy, arching under him and gasping as he comes, and Derek knows.

This changes _everything._

 

**iii. Apart**

He should have noticed.

That’s the thing.

After everything--

“Derek,” Erica whimpers, and he hates the fear in her voice.

“How long?” Derek asks, thinking. He saw Stiles at the last pack meeting, but that’s been--his stomach turns.

Four days.

“Boyd stayed with him Friday after the meeting,” she says softly. But nothing else.

Derek feels like he’s going to be sick. This--how the fuck had this happened.

Peter glares at him. “This,” he snarls through a mouthful of fangs, “is your fault. Whatever happens to him, Derek--it’s you fucking fault.”  


	3. Chapter 3

**The Big Reveal**

 

He tells his dad on a Saturday afternoon, a week after the bruises have faded.

Derek is on one side of him, and Peter is against the wall--the alpha and his second and the human who somehow became part of the pack.

He has a moment, before he starts talking, that he wishes the betas had come with them.

Then he looks at his dad, whose watched him for three weeks now with patient, waiting eyes, and for months before that with quiet growing suspicion and he says, “I need to tell you something.”

~*~

Derek didn’t like it.

They fought about it, while Isaac watched anxiously from the corner of the room and Boyd got more and more tense and Erica choked on little sobs.

“You can’t just wave this around, Stiles. It’s _dangerous.”_

“He’s my _dad,”_ Stiles hissed. “He’d _die_ before he did anything to hurt me.”

“That doesn’t--”

“Hurting this pack is hurting me,” Stiles snarled, pushing past the angry alpha to get to Erica, to drag her into his arms. He manhandled her onto the couch and glared up at Derek. “But you can’t expect me to keep lying to him. That’s my hard line, Derek. I won’t lose him to keep you and the pack.”

He’d meant it.  

And Derek knew it.

Sitting there, holding Erica and listening to Boyd’s panicked breathing behind him--he wasn’t sure what the hell he’d do if Derek said no. If he had to leave.

He didn’t _want_ to leave them.

“Ok,” Derek said, his voice soft and resigned. “Ok.

~*~

John is quiet, through all of it.

Through the explanation and the display, through Peter explaining the history between the Hales and the Argents, the history of the fire.

He’s quiet through it all, until Stiles finally says into the waiting tense silence, “Dad?”

“You aren’t going to leave them, are you?”

Stiles bites at his lip but there’s no point in denying it. He shakes his head. John sighs, and nods.

“Ok then. No more lying, ok?”

Stiles blinks at him and chokes out, “Ok.”

~*~

“That night--with Boyd and the little Reyes girl--that was--”

Stiles nods. “Um. He was trying to get to Derek, and the betas are the best way to do that.”

“You aren’t a wolf,” John says, and there’s so much _belief_ in that one sentence that Stiles feels tears in his eyes. Behind him, Peter moves, a quiet response to his packmate’s distress.

“No. I wasn’t supposed to be a message for Derek. I was for Scott,” he says, and his voice is bitter and sad.

John sighs, and rubs a hand over his face. “Dammit, kiddo. Why the hell didn’t you tell me?”

Stiles shakes his head, wordless and John opens his arms, and for a moment, as Stiles huddles there, in the warm safe embrace of his father, it doesn’t matter that there are werewolves and a new threat on the horizon and a barely cohesive pack.

It doesn’t matter that Boyd is still screaming himself awake at night and that Erica spends more nights crying herself to sleep in her alpha’s bed than her own and that Isaac feels like he’s one step out of the door.

It doesn’t matter that it’s been _three weeks_ and Scott still hasn’t asked him about the bruises on his face or the broken ribs or the stench of fear Stiles knows clings to him.

All that matters is his dad, holding him close and safe and murmuring as Stiles shakes against him, “It’s ok, son. You’re ok.”

For a moment, Stiles lets himself believe it.

~*~

The betas are hesitant.

It’s adorable really. John hides his smile, and watches.

Watches the way Stiles gently herds Erica along, the way he steers Boyd to the grill with a careful word. The way he teases and pokes at Isaac, until some of the tension seeps out of the blonde’s shoulders and he smiles shyly at Stiles.

He watches the way Derek and Stiles move around each other, the way Derek watches his boy moving around them, the face he makes when Stiles presses his truly awful potato salad on the alpha, the bright grin Stiles gives him.

He watches and he thinks--ok.

~*~

“You’re happier,” Peter says and Stiles shrugs. Nods.

“I didn’t like lying to him.”

Peter hums. “He was your alpha, Stiles. And you might not be a ‘wolf, but there’s a reason I offered you the bite.”

“We talked about you being creepy,” Stiles says lightly and Peter laughed, a soundless huff of breath more than anything.

~*~

He _likes_ having the betas at his house, is the thing.

They spend a lot of time at the new apartment he bullied Derek into and even more in the woods, training through elaborate games of tag and paintball and hide the flag.

But sometimes--sometimes he comes home, trailed by three betas, and they press into his space, and pull him down with them on the ground in a mess of limbs and blankets and pillow, of popcorn and burnt cookies.

The first time Derek slips through his bedroom window to find the betas curled like puppies on Stiles too small bed, Stiles propped against the headboard reading, he smiles at the alpha and nods at the spot on the bed near him. “Join us,” he murmurs, and Derek hesitates, for a moment, before his eyes go soft and he pads closer, curling around Stiles and listening as the boy reads to his pack.

 

**ii. Together**

 

Scott finds out by accident.

He’s laughing at Derek, hands tucked into the alpha’s pockets and leaning into his steady bulk, pressing a kiss to the underside of Derek’s jaw, just to see his eyes go red and the fond scowl Derek gives him, when Derek tenses and he hears a choked noise behind him.

He turns, and is a little startled to see Scott there.

He looks--ragged.

A little bit frayed, his clothes rumpled and dirty, and his eyes wild.

He looks _awful_.

“Scotty,” Stiles says, brightly.

He is still furious--he thinks he’s always going to be angry for Scott’s absolutely shitty behavior that night and the weeks before with Gerard Argent. But for all that he is angry--he _misses_ his brother.

“What are you _doing?”_

The question is a snarl, and it’s directed at Derek instead of Stiles and Derek presses Stiles closer.

“We aren’t doing this here,” he says, that calm finality that he uses to calm Erica’s panic attacks and Peter’s plotting.

It doesn’t work on Scott.

“Get _away_ from him,” Scott growls, his eyes glowing golden.

“Scott, buddy,” Stiles says, gentle and firm. “You’re not my alpha. And you’re not my dad. If I want to be with Derek--that’s my choice.”

That startles Scott enough that he loses his shift, and blinks, wide eyed and hurt, at Stiles.

“This is my choice,” Stiles says, clear and firm. “And when you aren’t in the mood to rip his throat out--we can talk about it, ok? But right now, Derek and I are gonna go. And you probably should too,  man. You don’t look so good.”

“Stiles,” Scott mumbles, and Derek slips between Stiles and Scott, herding him away.

“He’ll call you,” Derek says.

~*~

Later, spent and sticky and sprawled across Derek’s chest, his come slowly leaking from Derek, he says, “Scott is going feral, isn’t he?”

Derek’s grip on him tightens. “I left him, and Allison did--and we were it, we were his pack. He’s alone now.”

“You know that he’s not your responsibility,” Derek murmurs, his hand soothing on Stiles’ back, and Stiles nods, and presses his face into Derek’s neck, and if he cries, Derek doesn’t mention it.

“I would take him, if he would submit to me,” Derek says, suddenly.

“He won’t,” Stiles says, bleakly. He props himself up on his elbows, braced on Derek’s broad chest, and brushes a kiss against Derek’s pink lips. “But I love you for offering.”

Derek’s grip on him tightens, and he drags Stiles impossibly closer, and kisses him, hard and desperate.

 

**iii. Apart**

 

Time is funny.

He drifts a lot, in and out of consciousness.

Sometimes, he can hear a voice murmuring nearby.

Sometimes, he can feel heat, and that makes the cold so much worse.

He wonders if his dad has noticed he’s gone.

Part of him hopes he hasn’t--that no one will notice, until it’s too late.

A larger part of him knows that’s stupid. But hope _is_ stupid, and he’ll cling to it until it’s ripped away.

He sways there, in his cold room with the whistling wind and heat searing into his chest and he looks down, realizes, dully what she’s doing.

“Won’t work,” he mumbles, and she laughs.

She has a pretty laugh. Why, he wonders, fuzzily, do evil things so often come in pretty packages.

“Won’t,” he insists, and wonders why the hell he’s insisting.

“Silly  little puppy. I thought your alpha loved you,” she coos, and Stiles closes his eyes, not against the wind or the shackles digging into his wrists, not even against the runes burning his chest.

He closes his eyes like he can block out her words, and thinks, _I thought so too._

 


	4. Chapter 4

**prettiest threats**

 

It starts the way it always starts in Beacon Hills--dead bodies in the preserve.

It starts the week of July Fourth, amid sticky heat and slow drugging kisses and the laughter of his pack and the sometimes fleeting belief that everything was going to work out.

~*~

“Please,” he gasps, fingers scrambling for a handhold, “oh god, _please.”_

Derek laughs, drapes himself over Stiles back and gives another devastating roll of his hips, just to hear the way Stiles squeaks, just to feel him press back into the thrust.

They’ve been at this for hours, since the pack meeting ended and Stiles dragged him--all too willing--to bed. The sheets are mess of come and sweat and he thinks, even without rolling in it, he will smell like _sex_ and _Stiles_ for weeks.

Stiles clenches around him, begging, “Alpha, _please.”_

And Derek snarls, grips Stiles by the hips and drags him up, fucking into him hard and unrelenting, until Stiles is making wordless little punched out noises, and he’s shaking and he gasps, almost soundles, when he comes, shaking apart under Derek, tight and perfect around his cock, so beautiful it _hurts._

Derek groans as he comes, and Stiles shivers, but presses back into it, humming as he does.

“Dirty,” Derek slurs, nosing at Stiles’ ear. “Can’t do that in bed, it’s cheating.”

“Dunno what you’re talking about, big guy,” Stiles says, almost preening and Derek huffs and slides out of him. He pauses there on his knees, watching his come trickle out of Stiles pink hole, and he---

“Can--can I--” he starts, and Stiles hums, lazily.

He shrieks, all sleepy contentedness gone, when Derek licks over his puffy hole, when he licks _into_ him, and Derek groans, presses a hand to his hips to still him as he pushes Stiles into round three.

~*~

Stiles is in a pair of boxers and one of Derek’s tank tops, loose limbs and bright smile, sitting on the counter when Peter comes into the apartment. There’s a brief, familiar jolt of worry, before Peter tilts his head, a subtle baring of his throat, a wordless deference to Stiles and his place in the pack. The tension slips free of Stiles and he studies the older werewolf. “What’s wrong?”

“Isaac and I were running in the preserve,” he says and Stiles makes a pleased little noise that makes Peter’s lips quirk. “There was a dead body.”

Derek appears behind him, rubbing his hair dry. “What?”

Stiles is still, all that loose happy relaxed ease drained away by that five word sentence and Peter wishes, uselessly, that he could take it back.

That he was not seeing the boy retreat behind sharp, clever eyes, wasn’t seeing his nephew tense.

“Show me,” Derek says and Stiles slides off the counter.

“I’ll get my pants,” he says and Derek catches him by the wrist.

A better man would look away, would gives them a moment to sort through his.

Peter is not a better man, and he watches, openly curious, as Stiles steps into Derek’s space, tips his head forward to rest their foreheads together. “Don’t bother, Alpha. I’m coming.”

Derek’s sigh is long and heartfelt, and he murmurs. “Promise you’ll listen to me?”

“Don’t I always?” Stiles asks, and darts in to kiss Derek before he runs to find pants.

~*~

They tell the Sheriff. Stiles has washed the blood away, but the hickies Derek left on his skin is still bright and Peter watches Sheriff Stilinski eye them with an air of quiet resignation, before he focuses on what Stiles is saying.

He’s a good man, Peter thinks.

And a good ally for the pack, young and so often vulnerable.

“It’s a wendigo,” Derek says. “And it had it’s heart cut out.”

~*~

Derek holds Stiles in his arms, as the night twists around them, dark and hot, and even though his boy is sticky with sweat, he doesn’t move away.

“Do you think we should talk to Deaton?” Stiles asks.

Derek’s lips tighten. It’s been almost a week since the first body dropped. Peter had tapped some of his existing contacts and found out that the local selkie pod had a cub go missing, and the family of djinn had lost someone as well.

But there were no more _bodies_ and every day that went without contact or dead bodies, the tension ratcheted tighter.

“We will. If something doesn’t change in the next few days, we will.”

~*~

Something changes.

~*~

Full moons are different now. There are no chains and spikes to control enraged wolves. Instead, a human boy sits in the middle of a clearing and four betas wrestle around him, under the watchful eye of the Alpha wrapped around Stiles.

“Erica is getting better,” Stiles says, delighted, when she manages to throw Peter off and scramble to her feet before the wily older wolf pins her to the ground, snarling and snapping, a wide smile on his face.

“They all are,” Derek hums.

Stiles squeezes his hand, “You did good, alpha.”

Derek’s grip tightens, and he considers, for just a moment, rolling and pinning Stiles to the dirt. Rutting against him until he spilled wet and sticky against Stiles’ smooth back, and all the wolves knew he he belonged to.

“We did,” he rasps, around fangs and Stiles softens, reaches up to touch his cheek gently.

~*~

She steps out of the trees, and she is--

Pretty. Pretty and pale, long and willowy, with hair that billows in the wind, and she moves soundlessly, scentless, into the den of wolves.

Derek snarls, dragging Stiles a half centimeter closer, and the other wolves are growling, all fangs and claws and fury that she ignores.

She smiles, and stares at Stiles, and her gaze is hot and hungry as she breathes, “Hello, puppies.”

 

**ii together**

 

John _likes_ Derek.

It’s baffling, because no one likes Derek, certainly not the sheriff father of an underage boy he is fucking.

But John _does_ and Derek doesn’t understand.

Stiles laughs at him, tugs him down on the couch and sprawls across his lap, worming his way into Derek’s space with a kind of assuredness of his welcome that made Derek’s gut clench.

He wants Stiles here, always, that cocky grin on his lips and his kisses syrup sweet.

“You take care of me,” Stiles says, and it makes him preen, him and the wolf, both, that Stiles is acknowledging that. The boy huffs, silent laughter, and rolls his eyes. “Dad sees that, you know. The way you take care of us--me and the rest of the pack. He respects you.”

Derek blinks at Stiles, and he isn’t sure what the hell he’s meant to say to that.

Becuase no one respects him. He stares up, helpless and flayed open and Stiles smiles, soft and sure, leaning in to kiss him gently. “You’re a good alpha, baby.”

~*~

He tries to be.

He thinks he’s fucking up more than he’s getting right but then--he sees Stiles smiling, at him, like he’s the best thing Stiles has ever seen.

He hears Erica laugh, the first time since Stiles brought her and Boyd home. He watches Isaac blossom, a talented, thoughtful boy emerging from the timid scared boy hiding behind sharp claws and barbed words.

He sees Boyd, watching him. Like what he says and does _matters._ And he thinks, maybe he is. Maybe he fucks up, but maybe he’s getting enough right that it’s ok.

Maybe they all are.

~*~

Being with Stiles is like being caught in the middle of a hurricane. It’s like drowning, and flying, exhilarating and terrifying and he thinks, if he survives this--if he survives loving _Stiles_ , he will never love anyone else.

No sane person would live through a hurricane twice.

~*~

Stiles fucks with a kind of enthusiasm that makes Derek ache.

He fucks with _everything_ , hands grasping, lips constantly pressed against sweaty skin, constantly moving, rolling into Derek’s thrusts with little gasps and begging pleas, cursing and praising Derek in equal measure.

He fucks with everything, raw and open and vulnerable, in a way that Derek hasn’t been in so long he can’t remember _being_ that vulnerable.

But watching him, watching Stiles riding him, body turned golden by the setting sun, head tipped back and mouth slack with pleasure as he fucks himself of Derek’s hard cock--he _wants_ to be that vulnerable, with Stiles.

 

**iii. Apart**

 

She’s standing nearby, but not so close that Peter will complain--careful.

He wants to hate her.

“Did no one _feel_ him?” Derek snarls, and Peter blinks.

Stares at his nephew, his alpha by blood and choice. “Of fucking course we _felt_ him. Did you?”

Derek looks away, something like grief in his eyes, and she makes a move, aborted before it is formed, almost twitching to his side.

Peter snarls at her, just to see her flinch and duck her head, golden curls hiding her face.

Stiles would be so mad at hime-even now, even after Derek--.

“Stiles,” he says, carefully, and watches the way Derek flinches, notes the way Erica’s scent goes thick and bitter with guilt, “has felt like devastation and grief since _you_ fucked everything up, alpha.”

Derek closes his eyes, and Erica--”Derek,” she says, and it’s half plea, half command--the same way Stiles would cajole Derek. This just makes Derek’s spine go stiff and his eyes flare red.

“What I did or didn’t do, Peter, is my business. Not yours. Not the packs.”

It’s the same shit he’s been saying for weeks, now, and he’s suddenly _tired_ . Peter doesn’t believe it now anymore than he did the first time he heard it, when he held a sobbing Stiles in his arms and stared at Derek like maybe, _maybe_ he could explain.

“You have to trust us,” Erica whispers, and he all the anger roars back.

“I don’t have to do _anything_ ,” Peter snarls, “Certainly not for you.”

He turns, not bothering to watch the hurt in her eyes--she doesn’t get to be hurt. Not her.

Boyd and Isaac are already at the door, impatient and Derek calls after them, his voice tight and worried, and he sounds so much like the young, inexpereinced alpha who drove his pack away that Peter wonders if this whole summer was a fever dream.

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going to find Stiles, and bring him home. You do whatever the fuck you want to do--you’re good at it.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Personal Growth**

 

They aren't perfect. 

That's the thing. He sees the look in Derek's eyes, sometimes, and it's tired, almost defeated. Sometimes, Isaac snarls and bolts, away from them and the pack, clinging to Scott with a ferocity that it makes Stiles think he's actually leaving the pack. 

Sometimes, Peter's smarmy smile is too sharp, his words too cutting, and Stiles  _ wants _ to trust him. 

Sometimes Derek stops talking, and he feels a million miles away, even as he drags Stiles down on the couch with him. 

He thinks about that night in the Argent's basement, and the shadows in Erica's eyes, the way Boyd still bristles sometimes under the training that digs in and hurts the weres. 

He thinks about the fact that even now, almost a month after that night, Erica and Boyd still crawl into his bed at night, that Erica regularly cries herself to sleep in Derek's bed. 

They aren't perfect. 

But. They're  _ better _ . 

~*~ 

Erica licks her lips. "I think--have you thought about therapy?" 

Stiles looks at her, and his heart aches. Because she's so afraid. 

He remembers the girl that came to school after she was bitten, the way she'd been alive and vibrant, so far removed from the scared sick girl who moved like a ghost in the halls, and he wanted to see her again. 

He wanted all of that vicious vivacious self-confidence at his back. 

"Yeah," he murmurs, and her eyes brighten just a little. "I'll see if Peter knows anyone." 

Her smile is scared and hopeful and heartbreakingly beautiful. 

~*~ 

The apartment is part of the whole growing thing. 

“You aren’t living here,” Stiles says, giving the loft a disbelieving noise. 

Derek huffs. “It’s not that bad,” he argues. 

“There is a  _ hole _ in the wall! And I will get tetanus--look at these exposed pipes!”

Derek looks mutinus and Stiles sighs. He steps over to Derek, slips his arms around the older man’s waist and waits the ten seconds it takes for him to relax, leaning into Stiles. “Why do you like it?” 

“It’s defensible,” he says, immediately. “And there’s plenty of space for the betas--we can even train here, somewhat.” 

Stiles glances around, looking at it not as a living space, but a place for the pack to be  _ safe _ and train. And with that lens--it is a good place. It’s kind of perfect. He lets out a slow breath. 

“Is that what you grew up in? A training ground?” 

Derek’s jaw set and Stiles waits. Patient. 

“No,” he growls. “It was--we  _ had _ a training ground, and the preserve.” 

“And we should too--but the pack needs a  _ home,”  _ Stiles murmurs, and Derek sighs.

~*~ 

It’s Peter who finds it. 

And it’s perfect. It’s the penthouse, defensible if only because there was only entrance from the emergency stairwell and the elevator. 

It took up the entire top floor of the apartment complex, and they had access to the roof for training. Some nights, Stiles would lay there, sprawled in Derek’s lap and watch the stars. 

It was spacious and comfortable and perfect. 

It was perfect, and Stiles stares at Derek, his eyes patient and waiting because this is the Alpha’s decision. 

“Yeah,” he says. “I--yeah.” 

~*~ 

Sometimes, when Derek is training the betas, Peter will come and sit next to Stiles and give him books about the supernatural. 

He says it’s good for one of them to be educated. 

Stiles doesn’t argue with him--but he thinks, privately to himself, that he Peter is, in his own quiet way,  _ trying _ to be a better packmate. 

~*~ 

“Stiles,” Peter says and his voice is... _ different.  _ Furious and hurt, and Stiles blinks. He sounds almost as furious as he had been when he was murdering his way through Kate and her cohorts. 

“You should go home,” he says and Stiles goes still, staring at Peter. 

Because--even with the quiet distance in Derek the past few weeks, he’d never expected this. 

“Peter,” he says, his voice shaking. 

“Stiles, go home,” Peter says gently, and Stiles takes a stumbling step back. 

Erica is coming out of Derek’s room. 

Erica is coming out of Derek’s room, and she’s wearing a long Henley that hangs off one shoulder. 

There’s a dark bruise fading against her clavicle. 

“Oh,” she says, going still, her eyes wide and startled. “Stiles.” 

Derek appears behind her, and Stiles  _ knows  _ what Derek looks like, fresh out of bed and recently fucked.

He knows and his stomach churns, suddenly. 

He stumbles back a step and his hip slams into the counter, the starburst of pain almost lost in the roaring in his ears and the way he--

“I’ve got you,” Peter croons, his voice suddenly in Stiles ear, and his claws grounding pricks of pain on his shoulder. 

There’s a noise behind him, something muffled and he hiccups, choking on a sob as Peter snarls. Then he’s in the elevator, and it’s gliding down, and all he can  _ see  _ is Derek, sweaty and bare chested and his eyes distant as he watches Stiles. 

He breaks, then, collapsing into messy sobs, and Peter catches him. 

Pulls him close and hums in his ear as Stiles cries. 

~*~ 

It’s personal growth, he thinks, that he doesn’t want to kill both of them. 

That he wants Derek to be  _ happy _ more than he wants Derek to be with him. 

It’s personal growth that Peter  _ doesn’t _ kill both of them. 

He lies in bed and thinks personal growth is shitty as fuck. 

 

**i. Together**

 

He likes to talk after sex. 

Not right after--right after he dozes and Derek watches him. It’s the only time Stiles is anything close to still, limbs limp where they wrap around him, mouth slack and puffy from his kisses. 

Like this, he’s impossibly beautiful and Derek wants to  _ keep _ him, wants him here always. 

Wants to be the only person to ever see Stiles like this. 

But when he wakes--he always wakes--from his impromptu nap, he likes to talk. 

Laura used to say that Derek didn’t understand intimacy because he’d never experienced it. That he was too silent to be intimate with anyone who wasn’t family, and that’s why he had so many hookups that ended with the last person orgasming. 

Derek never argued because the one time he’d gotten close to someone, she turned around and burnt his world to the ground and he had no interest in repeating that. 

But then--there was Stiles. 

Stiles who liked to talk after sex, who rambled about the books he was reading and the games he was playing, who frets about his pack and Erica’s mental health and his father’s diet and who mocks Peter. Stiles rocks up on his knees when he’s enthusiastic about some new piece of random obscurity he chased down a wiki hole at three in the morning, and he burrows close to Derek when he talks about his dad’s drinking and his mom’s death and how scared he was when Scott was bitten. 

He liked Stiles, long before the fell into bed together, and he  _ trusts _ Stiles, with his pack and his safety, bares his neck to the human boy when they’re fucking, and doesn’t mind when Stiles bites back if Derek says something stupid. 

He liked Stiles before--but it’s those conversations, when Stiles is sprawled across his bed and the scent of sex still clings in the air and to the sheets, when Derek slowly begins to murmur back when Stiles shares something--that is when he falls in love with Stiles. 

 

**ii. Apart**

 

There’s a new noise in the room. There is still, the whistling wind. 

But there’s something else too. He realizes it after she comes in and carefully carved runes into his skin, etching deep into the muscle and humming softly while he screamed. 

“Don’t do this,” he mumbles. 

“Silly. You know what I’m doing, Stiles.” 

“It’s---it’s too much. It’ll kill you.” 

She tuts, and cuts another curving line on his bicep and he screams, his voice a hoarse, weak thing. 

The burning cut of the knife has made him forget how fucking  _ thirsty _ he is. 

“I looked--you can’t do it.” 

“Sweetheart,” she smiles. “I  _ am _ doing it.” 

“Why?” he gasps. Because he doesn’t  _ understand _ . She’s powerful. She’s beautiful. She doesn’t  _ need _ this. 

“Because even ancient witches die, sweetheart. We use up all our magic and we die.” 

_ The nemeton is unchecked power. It’s so much raw power, what she’s doing could kill her.  _

He laughs hysterically, and she giggles in answer as she begins cutting over his heart. It won’t. It won’t kill her--it’ll let her live forever. 

“Not much longer, sweetheart,” she hums, and begins the final rune and he finally loses the fight to stay conscious. 

~*~ 

He wakes to a whistling wind that is cold and familiar, to a line of heat trickling down his arms and a wet  _ plop _ . 

He can see it and his stomach churns as he watches his blood draining into the bucket. 

Stiles stares at it, panic making his breath go tight and short, and he thinks, as white spots dance in his eyes,  _ I’m glad she got the wrong one.  _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't yell at me! Trust me. 
> 
> Also--I love love reading every comment I get. But I am swamped IRL right now, so if I don't respond, please don't take it personal. I swear it's not. <3


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good grief, y'all are mad at Derek and Erica....

**Broken Things**

 

Peter watches them--during training, and during those quiet movie nights at Stiles’ house that devolves into cuddle sessions. During the afternoons when they’re doing nothing, just clustered together because they’re _better_ together, and he sees it.

What none of them realize.

He thinks Derek does, sometimes, but his nephew looks at Stiles like a love drunk fool, and he isn’t sure if Derek sees what Stiles is--or if he just sees the boy he loves.

~*~

They’re better.

Better than they were, a fractured group of disjointed parts.

But for all that they are _better--_ there are still cracks. Places they are brittle and breakable.

He wonders sometimes, how much pressure it would take, to shatter them.

~*~

Stiles sits in the preserve, back against a tree and listens to the howling around him.

“Go right, Boyd,” he murmurs and there’s an answering snarl as Isaac shoots past the beta. “Good. Now run.”

Boyd turns and sprints, and Stiles smiles.

Almost--

Peter slides out of the woods his eyes shining blue, his grin feral a moment before Erica tackles him, sending the beta face first into the dirt.

A howl makes the hair on his neck raise and he mumbles, “You need to hurry.”

He can hear them--Isaac and Boyd both, racing through the woods and Erica still fighting with Peter, barely holding him back as he snaps and snarls at Stiles.

Boyd comes flying into the clearing, and Stiles grins, straightens a little--and feels claws circle his throat, and Derek murmurs, “You’re dead.”

His heart lodges in his throat, and he goes utterly still in the Alpha’s grip, and then Derek--

Kisses his shoulder and steps away, looking at the bloody betas and says, “What did you do wrong?”

~*~

Sometimes, he sees Isaac and he smells like Scott.

He looks guilty, slinking back into the pack house, his lips bitten pink and hair messy, and smelling like another wolf.

“You know,” Peter says, watching him from the shadows just to see the younger beta jump, “you’re playing a dangerous game.”

Isaac flushes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I know you like Scott--I don’t know why. Frankly, I don’t _care_ why. You do, against all reason and logic. And Stiles does. I won’t kill your precious _Scott._ But if you hurt Derek--if your twisting loyalties hurt him--I will gut you myself and serve you up as a present for your Alpha.”

“Stiles--” he starts, his voice shaking, and Peter laughs.

Drifts closer, and murmurs, “Who do you think _told_ me to watch you?”

Isaac pales, and Peter moves past him, and out of the house.

~*~

Stiles jerks awake, heavy hands pressing him into his mattress, golden eyes glowing above him, a scream trapped in his throat.

“Hey,” Boyd says and Stiles sobs. It’s messy and hitching and he buries his face in his pillows. His bruises throb, and Boyd crawls into the bed, curling around Stiles and pulling his lingering pain, slowly.

“I’m sorry,” he says, his voice low.

“You didn’t do anything,” Stiles says, voice muffled.

“That’s kind of the point,” he says, voice dry and Stiles huffs into his pillow. Squirms around until he can peer up at Boyd in the dark.

“Are you mad that I didn’t do anything to stop him?”

“Of course not,” Boyd says, and Stiles nods.

“It was torture, Boyd. It was awful, for all of us. But no one is at fault except Gerard.”

“I wanted to protect you. I wanted to protect both of you.”

“I know,” Stiles says, and then, “But we can protect each other now. Right?”

Boyd is quiet for a long moment, before he nods. “Yeah. We can.”

~*~

“The spell is a strengthening spell,” Deaton says. He is blank faced and placid and it makes Peter itch to snarl. “She is, essentially, draining the strength of those she takes--and taking it into herself. I don’t know why--she’s a powerful witch, and this kind of strength...whatever she’s doing, it’s not good.”

“But you don’t _know_ what it is.”

“What doesn’t matter. Why is she taking _who_ she’s taking?” Peter demands.

And he sees it, because he’s looking for it, the lightening quick flicker of the druid’s gaze before he’s smiling. “The alpha’s heart.”

~*~

“I won’t let her take you,” Stiles says, fiercely. They’re alone now, and Derek is watching him, his gaze shuttered and his lips pressed together. “Do you hear me? She can’t take you.”

His fingers are fisted in Derek’s shirt, demanding the alpha’s attention, and Derek softens, staring down at him.

“I know you won’t,” Derek murmurs, and leans in to kiss him, gently, like he’s fragile and precious.

~*~

“You need to tell him,” Peter says, watching Derek as the elevator takes Stiles away. The alpha smells...off. Like Stiles and sex, but bitter too, like guilt and secrets.

“Tell him what?”

“You aren’t protecting him by keeping the danger a secret,” Peter says. “We _both_ know she’ll attack your mate--”

“He isn’t,” Derek says, distantly and Peter flinches.

“Derek--”

“Drop it, Peter. Stiles--what he is or isn’t, it’s none of your concern.”

“It affects this pack,” Peter snaps.

Derek shoves him into the wall, his eyes bleeding red, and Erica appears behind them, her scent worried and touched with anger. “Derek!”

“Leave it alone, Peter,” Derek snarls around fangs and Peter glares, until he growls and Peter finally, _finally,_ tips his head and bares his throat in grudging submission.

~*~

They’re better.

Not perfect. Not even close.

But better.

But he thinks--one wrong touch will shatter them to pieces.

 

**i. apart**

 

There was mountain ash on the window and an armed sheriff at the door. It was disconcerting, and Derek stared at him, eyes wide and hurt.

“He doesn’t want to see you,” John says, and Derek can _hear_ the lie in his voice.

“Or do you not want him to see me,” Derek asks, carefully.

“Can you _blame_ me, Hale? Have you seen my son?”

Derek closes his eyes, against the pain and accusation, and says, “I don't blame you. But I want to explain.”

“Explain what--that you broke his heart? Or that you didn’t notice when he was fucking _kidnapped.”_

Derek holds his gaze, even though he wants to whine, wants to bare his throat and crawl away from this human alpha defending his pup.

He wants Stiles, a visceral ache so strong it makes him want to howl.

“You don’t have the right to explain,” John says, tired suddenly. “And I’m not waking him up, not for you. When he’s ready to see you--he’ll let you know.”

“Please,” Derek says, almost begs, and John gives him a sad look.

“Go home, Derek. Leave Stiles alone.”

 

**iii. interlude**

 

The truth is--she knew it would hurt.

There was no way to avoid it. But she didn’t expect it to hurt like _this_. She didn’t expect to feel it in every breath, for it to ache under her skin.

She expected it to hurt, and she thought she knew what hurt was, thought she’d learned when they held her down in that fucking basement, when they shoved wolfsbane in her mouth and--she closes her eyes and listens to her pack, to the familiar howls that are so far away and she can hear it--the familiar steady beat of Stiles’ heart, and Peter’s rumbling laughter, that sound that she only ever hears when Derek is with Stiles. She can picture them, even here where she’s running alone.

The moon is bright and full and her pack is whole and it _hurts_ how much she wants to keep them happy.

It hurts that she knows she can’t keep them safe.


	7. Chapter 7

**Grief**

 

He isn’t sure how he gets home. 

He isn’t sure of anything. 

All he can see is Derek, standing guiltily in his doorway, and that dark bruise fading on Erica’s throat. All he can feel is the ground shaking under his feet. 

~*~ 

Gentle hands guide him into his house, and he can hear voices, distantly, through the ringing in his ears, before his dad’s hands are on him, turning him, and the tenuous grip he’s kept on his emotions shatter, and he falls. 

He falls into his dad, sobbing, and John catches him, holds him as they sink to the floor, as Stiles cries, wordless messy sobs buried in his father’s chest. 

“Shh, son,” John hums, “I’ve got you. I’ve got you.” 

~*~ 

The first few days are a blur. He crawls into his bed, and doesn’t leave. When he can, he sleeps, and when he can’t, he turns on documentaries, watches them until his eyes burn because they don’t remind him too much of anything beyond this bed. 

His dad brings him food, and he can hear other voices in the house sometimes, but he doesn't see anyone.

He doesn't want to see anyone. 

He doesn't want anything, wants the whole goddamn world to fall away and stop spinning. 

~*~

The lights startle him enough that he flails and makes a strange croaking noise before dragging the blankets over his head. 

“Go ‘way,” he mumbles into them. 

“Can’t do that, sweetheart.” 

He squeezes his eyes closed, his heart twisting at the familiar voice, the teasing endearment. 

He hasn’t thought about the pack since--

He hasn’t let himself think about them. And Peter is here, in his space, demanding his attention and he has no idea what to say or what he wants. 

“Your pack needs you, Stiles,” Peter coaxes, and a whine builds in his throat. “You can’t hide from the world because we  _ need _ you.” 

“Derek doesn’t,” Stiles whispers, fresh tears trailing down his cheeks and pooling cold and ticklish in his ears as he stare at the ceiling. 

“Derek is an idiot,” Peter says, succinctly. 

Stiles thinks about it though. The nights Erica turned to Derek for comfort. The way she was soft and sweet, beautiful and strong--everything an alpha could want. 

He thinks about the way she had looked  _ right _ in Derek’s clothes, rumpled from his bed. 

“Maybe he isn’t,” he mumbles. “Maybe I’m the idiot.” 

~*~ 

There was safety in being  _ Derek’s _ . 

There was the sex, and he loved that. He loved the intimacy of being the one Derek let in, the one who could make him laugh, the one who got to see him sleep soft and cuddly in the morning, who saw him fucked out and begging. 

He got to see Derek, the man. 

Not just the strong alpha who was shaping his pack into a family. 

But there was security in it too. 

In being the human Derek loved--security in his place within the pack, a place that no one would ever question because Derek loved him. 

And he was stupid, stupid enough to think it mattered. 

That because Derek murmured sweet empty promises, this would last. That he’d get to  _ keep _ the pack, that the pack would want to keep him. 

Now though. 

He isn’t Derek’s. 

And he doesn’t belong, a fragile human in a pack of werewolves. 

~*~ 

He cries, sitting on the floor of the shower, until the water runs icy and he is shivering too hard to sob anymore. 

~*~ 

“Time to get up, sweetheart,” Peter says. 

Stiles glares at him, and he smiles back, patient the way he has been every day for almost two weeks. 

Present and not pushing, and Stiles doesn’t know what to do with that. With  _ him. _

“Your pack needs you.” 

~*~ 

He thinks that Boyd and Isaac look awkward and uncomfortable in his room, until he realizes they just look  _ bad.  _

Thin and exhausted, with a haunted look in their eyes that reminds Stiles unpleasantly of the weeks before school got out, when all of them were struggling to stay alive and Derek was finding his footing as an alpha. 

They look like omegas, and that--that more than anything make Stiles sit up, makes him open his eyes and make a quiet whine in the back of his throat, and it makes the wolves move, swarming him. Isaac shoves under his arm, pressing into him and shaking, and Boyd curls around his back, nose pressed to Stiles throat, a heavy sigh making him shudder. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, “I’m so sorry, I’m here--I’m here.” 

He looks t Peter, standing in the doorway of his room, his hands shoved in his pockets and gaze intent and Stiles understands, suddenly, what Peter has been saying for the past several days. 

He closes his eyes, knowing damn well what he has to do. 

Later. He’ll deal with it later. 

For now, he cuddles with his packmates, whispers soothing apologies and listens as they whisper the same, and lets the comforting presence of them ease the ache in his gut. 

~*~ 

His hands are shaking, and Peter looks at him, sidelong. “You don’t have to do this.” 

“I do. You saw them.” 

Peter hums in the back of his throat, “They’re not your betas, though.” 

Stiles bristles, fists clenched. “They’re not my betas, but they are my  _ pack _ .” 

The elevator slows to a halt and Stiles strides off, furious. 

He lets that anger carry him even when Derek comes around the corner of the kitchen. He freezes at the sight of them, pale and Stiles  _ hates _ how beautiful he is. 

“Stiles,” he breathes, and he says it--Stiles swallows, shoves all those memories and aching  _ want _ down. 

“Am I part of your pack?” Stiles demands. 

“ _ What?”  _

“You’re pack,  _ Alpha, _ ” Stiles snarls, twisting it into almost a curse. “Am I still a part of it?” 

“Of--Stiles, of course, how could you even ask that?” 

Stiles stares at him, at his beautifully bewildered face, and he wants, desperately, to punch him. 

“How can I  _ ask  _ that? How the hell do you think, Derek?” 

“You--nothing’s changed,” Derek says, desperately. 

He freezes, pain ripping through him so suddenly he isn’t sure how he doesn’t end up doubled over and sobbing. 

He doesn’t. 

He stands there, as his ex and his alpha and the man who broke his heart stares at him like he should be fine. 

Like  _ Stiles _ should be fine. 

“Great,” Stiles says, his voice bright and chirpy and so fake even Derek flinches a little. “Then I’ll see you at pack night.” 

He turns, and stalks away, and if he hears Derek’s pleading,  _ “Stiles,”  _ he doesn’t slow or even acknowledge it. 

 

**ii. after**

 

There are cuts, deep and raw, runes etched into his skin, livid red against the pale white and dark bruises. 

His wrists are raw, oozing blood and puss and he has burns, on his arms and back and across his feet. 

He’s so still, so laying in Derek’s arms that he almost thinks he’s holding a corpse. There is only the thin, slow beat of Stiles heart that keeps him from breaking down completely. 

“Put him down, please,” Deaton murmurs. “I can’t do anything until you lay him down.” 

“Will you--can you--” 

A hand lands on his shoulder and he registers his uncle, even as he can’t drag his gaze away from Stiles.

“Let Deaton help him,” Peter says, and his voice is gentle. 

He hasn’t been gentle with him since before that afternoon with Erica. 

When he broke everything. 

He doesn’t know what it means, that Peter is being gentle. 

“Let him go, Derek,” Peter coaxes and Derek--Derek does, tears falling silently while he does. 

 

**iii. together**

 

Stiles doesn’t expect Derek to be romantic. 

He expects mind blowing sex. He expects the edge of dominance that he  _ craved, _ Derek’s grumbly growl ordering him to his knees, holding him down as he licked Stiles open. 

He expects the biting, the marking, even the way Derek rubs his come into Stiles skin, after, the way his eyes gleam red and satisfied, and his kiss is pleased as he rumbles, “ _ Mine.” _

He expects a lot, from sleeping with Derek Hale. 

He doesn’t expect gentle kisses, or the way sometimes, Derek will straddle him, ease down on his cock and ride him mind-blowingly slow, his head tipped back, throat bare, utterly vulnerable. 

He doesn’t expect the little gifts, books and coffee and food and tiny poems dropped on his seat in the jeep. 

He doesn’t expect the way Derek will hold him, clinging even after sex and the afterglow, holding him so tight Stiles can’t breathe. 

He doesn’t expect those nights, when he wakes in the middle of the night to Derek’s soft whispers, to him, almost begging, “Please don’t let me go. Don’t give up on me. Please, Stiles.” 

He doesn’t expect it--but he loves it. Loves  _ Derek. _

So he holds on, just as tight, and when Derek begs under the cover of night, Stiles presses kisses into his skin, under his jaw, along his scruff, and whispers back, “Never, Derek. I’m never letting you go.” 

 


	8. Chapter 8

**The Alpha’s Heart**

 

“What do you think it meant?”

Derek looks at her. They’ve taken to jogging through the preserve, late at night, when Erica’s short tempered and anxious. She always smells more settled after, and falls asleep on the couch, and if he can’t give her more help than that, he’ll take what he can give.

There is a tiny wrinkle between her eyes, worry in the tight set of her lips. It’s been there since they left Deaton’s office, those three damning words ringing in the air.

_The Alpha’s heart._

“I don’t know,” he says. Not quite true. Not quite not.

She opens her mouth, like she’s going to argue with him, but he flashes his eyes and adds a burst of speed, and they leave conversation behind.

~*~

Stiles.

Stiles is special.

He thinks he knew that almost from the beginning.

He remembers, listening to Stiles talking to Scott, remembers realizing Stiles was sacrificing something important, something that _mattered_ to him, to help Derek.

He remembers the way Stiles’ had trembled under his weight in a cold pool, the way he’d smelt of chlorine and determination and terror, and how he’d kept Derek above water, shoving him up even as he sank.

He remembers the bruises on Stiles face, and the way he’d looked, in his kitchen, protective between the Alpha and his betas, demanding he do _better._

Stiles is _special._

And that has always scared him.

It still does.

~*~

“Please,” he groans, and sharp nails dig into his shoulders as Stiles arches under him, his entire body a wordless plea for _more._

“Love you like this,” Derek rumbles, propping himself up on his elbows, blinking down at him as he thrusts in, achingly slow.

Stiles is so tight, and so damn _hungry_ for it, almost mindless in his greedy need for more.

“Wanna keep you like this, baby,” he mumbles, and snaps his hips to hear Stiles shriek. He tweaks Stiles nipple, twists it as he slams back in, nailing his boy’s prostate and reveling in the whining cry it earns him.

“Der, _please,”_ Stiles whimpers and Derek makes a quiet shushing noise, dipping down to kiss him as he takes Stiles cock in hand and sets the hard, unforgiving pace he knows will send Stiles headlong into orgasm.

He leans back when he feels the breath catch in Stiles’ throat,leans back and stares, wide eyed and hungry for it as his boy comes.

It’s beautiful. He goes limp, and all the tight lines on his face, all of the expression melts away into slack bliss, his lips red and open, eyes dazed and unseeing as Derek fucks him through it, as come splatters between them in a lovely, fragrant mess.

He is beautiful, like this.

Always, but this--Stiles, mid orgasm, messy and bruised from his lips and hands, is Derek’s favorite.

It’s his favorite and he wants to keep it and he doesn’t want anyone to see him like this, ever.

He gathers Stiles close, shifts so the boy is sprawled over him, and pulls him down to meet ever roll of Derek’s hips, fucking him hard and desperate, and when he comes, he gasps, “ _Mine,”_ around a mouthful of fangs, his vision washed red.

Stiles hums and presses into a kiss, and says, soft in his fervent agreement, “Yours.”

~*~

His mom was the alpha, the head of their pack and their family.

She always smiled at her husband, at Andrew, human and weak, her eyes soft and loving and called him the heart.

Her heart, the pack’s heart, the beating center of them. She told Laura that every Alpha needed a cold Left, a solid Second, and a brightly burning heart.

Laura had listened to those avid lessons and Derek had listened, half aware as he sketched, because he knew what he was--he was going to be Laura’s Second, and Cora would be the Left and she would love the heart, because that’s how packs worked.

He didn’t think about it, even as he knew it was true.

He knew when he bit Boyd, that the strong quiet man would grow into his place as Second.

He knew, when Erica flashed her fangs and threw herself into a dirty kiss, that she would be his Left.

He had never expected to find a heart.

Even as he took Stiles into his bed, as he let the stubborn human carve a place in the pack, he’d never expected it to turn into _this._

And now--now that it is has--he has no idea how to keep Stiles safe.

~*~

“I know what you’re doing,” Peter says, and Derek looks away from him. He can still taste the frustrated anger in Stiles when Derek had summarily dismissed him.

“It won’t work, Derek,” he says, and he sounds tired. Frustrated.

Like Peter always sounded, when he was annoyed with his especially tiresome nieces and nephews.

“You’re hurting him,” he says, last and Derek grits his teeth.

“Go away, Peter,” he orders, and tells himself he’s more relieved than not, when Peter obeys.

~*~

“You know you have to,” Erica says. She’s sitting close to him, and his stomach lurches because he sees it, the pity in her eyes.

“You want this,” she whispers, and he snarls at her, pins her to the bed with one hand, fingers digging into her collarbone.

She bares her teeth and fights back, scratching and clawing at him as she shoves him to his back, straddles him and rips his head back by the hair. Her breath is a harsh pant in his ear and he wants to throw up, wants to shove her away from him, wants to _run._

“You _want_ this,” she insists, and he whines, a moment before she kisses him.

It happens so fast he can barely react.

So fast that his claws drop but don’t quite dig in before she’s biting down on his lower lip and sliding out of his lap.

He hears Peter, distantly, saying, “You should go home.”

But all he can see is Erica, crawling out of his bed and looking sex rumpled, a bruise dark on her collarbone. She gives him a sad smile and then saunters out of bedroom in his henley and he can _smell_ Stiles, the shock of confusion rolling off him as he stares at Erica.

“Oh,” she says, voice perfectly innocent, heartbeat steady. “Stiles.”

 

**i. after**

 

He does this thing. Stiles notices it after about the third pack meeting. It’s the first one he doesn’t limp into, half-carried by Peter, although he can feel Peter’s gaze, sharp and assessing as he gauges Stiles progress.

But Stiles--his focus is on Derek. Because Derek does this thing, when he comes in. This thing where his entire body kind of comes up, a hopeful puppy tilt to his head, his entire being sort of _leaning_ toward Stiles.

It’s adorable.

And infuriating.

He does something else, too. It’s just as noticeable. Stiles settles in the corner of the couch, and Boyd drops heavily next to him, Peter perched on the arm of the couch with his fingers brushing against the nape of Stiles neck, and it’s _only_ then, that Stiles looks at Derek.

And all of that hopeful anticipation drains out of him, his eyes going bleak and shuttered, his mouth tightening a little as he gives a tiny nod, to himself, before he straightens and begins the pack meeting.

Stiles hates it.

He hates _all_ of it.

And he hates most of all that Derek put them here.

~*~

“He’s trying,” Isaac says, one afternoon while Stiles is massaging his leg. It cramped up after training, and he thinks, bitterly, that Derek was right--he should be training with them again yet.

“I don’t care.”

“Stiles--” Isaac says, a whine creeping into his voice, and Stiles finally finally, looks up.

The beta flinches at his cold gaze. “You are one step away from leaving this fucking pack, Isaac. You’ve had your eyes on Scott since before Derek bit you, so I don’t know why the hell you’re fighting it. What if we do fall apart, huh? You get to walk away, free and clear.” He smiles, meanly, “Derek and I would be doing you a favor.”

There’s a long beat of silence, and Isaac shifts by the window, the breeze pushing delicate curtains that Erica insisted on, in the stillness of the room. “I don’t want Scott,” he whispers. “I haven’t for awhile. Not since you made us a pack.”

 

**iii. interlude**

 

The first time, it was her idea.

It was her idea, and Boyd followed her, because he was besotted.

Isaac thought they were something _deep_ and _meaningful_ , some epic love story, and sometimes--sometimes she thought they could have been.

If.

If they had stayed.

If they weren’t tortured.

If Gerard hadn’t--she closes her eyes and inhales.

If either of them loved Stiles less, and each other more.

If.

Maybe.

She closes her eyes, and inhales.

If and maybe, she learned a long time ago, in a parade of doctor’s offices promising _if_ and _maybe_ and snakeoil miracles--if and maybe don’t mean shit.

She sits on the roof and listens to the boy below her crying, near silent sobs, and thinks--

The first time, it was her idea.

When she leaves this time--it will be because she has to.

 


	9. Chapter 9

**Taken**

 

He is pack.

Derek won't take that from him and Stiles refuses to give it up. _Derek_ might be done with him but that doesn't mean the pack is, and Stiles will fight to keep them.

Even if it hurts, seeing Derek.

~*~

He is pack, but he lingers on the outskirts of it, pushed there by his alpha.

He _hates_ it.

“Derek is trying to protect you,” Peter says, patiently.

Stiles snorts. “Is he? Is that why he hooked up with Erica?”

It stings, still, and he closes his eyes as the betrayal washes through him, again.

Last night when he’d left the pack meeting, he’d heard Derek and Erica talking, the low rumble and huffed out laugh he knew Derek made when he was most relaxed and happy, and it cut at him, a soundtrack on repeat that he wanted to keep because Derek was _happy_ and that he _hated_ because _how dare he._

“I’m not going to disappear just because Derek wants to stick his dick somewhere else,” Stiles snaps, embracing the anger because it’s better than the pain.

Peter watches him, expression tight and unhappy. But nods, and follows Stiles as they patrol the preserve.

~*~

“You know, you don’t have to come to these,” Derek says, and Stiles pauses in the middle of shrugging into his plaid.

Erica is still in the kitchen, but he can feel her watching him. Watching them.

“I’m pack, right? Pack meetings sorta mean the whole pack. Unless that book you gave me is wrong.”

Derek’s expression does something complicated and frustrated, and he shakes his head. “If it’d be easier for you--”

“You don’t get to think about what would be easier for me, Derek. Not anymore.”

Stiles turns away without waiting for a response to that, and gets the hell outta dodge before he can start crying.

~*~

Boyd stays close to Stiles, after.

He doesn't talk much, but then--Boyd never talked much.

"Do you ever think about what would have happened if we hadn't ended up in that basement?" Stiles asks, one night around two am, when the TV is buzzing louder than the volume and Boyd is a big dark shadow on the other side of the bed.

"Yeah," he says, quietly. "But then I think it's not worth thinking about. Because we did. And you saved us."

"I didn't," Stiles says, immediately.

"You _did_ ," Boyd insists, and he twists, to stare down at Stiles, his eyes golden in the dark and intent. "Stiles, you kept us going in that basement, even when they took Erica. And you came _back_ for us. Even when it was over, and you had no reason to protect us, no reason to stay with the pack--you did. You made us into a pack, made Derek be a better alpha. _You_ did that."

Stiles shakes his head, weakly and the beta sighs, and stares up at the ceiling. "You saved us, Stiles. What might have happened, if Erica and I got away--it doesn't matter, because in the end, we didn't, and you saved us."

Stiles is quiet for a long time, and then, softly, "That doesn't seem to matter much to Erica."

~*~

The witch is beautiful.

She looks--ordinary in Beacon Hills, where everyone is supernaturally beautiful. She's gentle smiles, and pale skin and long golden hair twisted into elegant braids. She haunts Beacon Hills, moves around it and the pack with a kind of slow grace, a smile twisting her lips as she watches them, but never gets close.

Stiles sees her watching him, sees the way her gaze is avid and bright and hungry in a way that makes him shiver, but she always turns away, retreats before any of the wolves can approach her.

She goes with a smile on her lips, pleased like the entire thing is going exactly as planned.

Derek and Erica touch more, in public, and sometimes Stiles will see her watching them, a tiny furrow in her brow, before her gaze darts back to him, and he takes a shuddery breath and stares back, false bravado and fear almost choking him.

~*~

He falls asleep, and even as he does, he thinks--this is wrong.

He falls asleep and it's painfully easy, easy in the way sleep hasn't been since before his mother died, and when he wakes--

When he wakes, his hands are chained above his head, and his bare feet scrape helplessly at the cold ground and the wind whistles.

His head is throbbing, and his mouth is dry and he stares at her as she drifts closer.

Even now, even like this, dressed in ratty black jeans and a stained shirt--she is beautiful, and he hates her for that.

Hates her for being so damn pretty and disarming.

"You can't hurt them," he says numbly, and she smiles, like he's done a particularly clever trick.

"I don't have to hurt them--I never wanted to. I want to finish my ritual."

"And you think I can do that for you?" he demands, his voice high and incredulous.

"I think," she says, and her smile is sharp, for the first time, sharp and cutting and he thinks suddenly of the dead bodies in the preserve, the way they'd been _hurt_ , "I know that you can. And you do too."

~*~

She isn't like the hunters in Gerard's basement.

She doesn't talk, she doesn't gloat. She doesn't even seem to enjoy it, if the curl to her lip as she cuts into him is any indication. She just _does_ it, cuts him open with her wickedly sharp anathema, her gaze narrow and intent, murmuring soft under her breath as she finishes the runes on his chest. Then she leaves him there, hanging and bleeding and listening to the wind, an apologetic smile on her lips when she says, "We'll need another few days to finish."

He watches her go, the steady clip of her heels against the cold ground, and the wind whistling in the corner.

There's a part of him that wants this to take _weeks_ , because it means she needs him alive, and if he's alive, there's _hope_.

And there is a part of him that wants to close his eyes and bare his throat, let her slice him open and clean him out, let her take every damn thing she needs because then it'll be over.

He closes his eyes, and waits.

~*~

The truth is--he expects to die there.

It's not like that night in the school, when Peter had terrorized them and he had been so fucking afraid but also so confident that his dad would save them.

It's not even like the night in Gerard's basement, when the hunters had beaten him, had tortured Boyd, had raped Erica.

Because then, he'd held onto the thought that someone--Derek, Scott, _Chris_ \--would save them.

They hadn't. In the end, the hunters just lost interest and he'd gone, chased away to be a message.

He'd left Boyd there, screaming behind his restraints, and Erica, limp and defeated on the carpet.

And he thinks--this time. This time he'll be left behind. Derek doesn't _need_ him, doesn't even _want_ him, and the rest of the pack--they'll be better without Stiles and his pesky humanity.

He thinks this time, without a pack bond and with no one keeping track of his whereabouts--he'll die.

And if it means that Derek is safe. That his pack is _safe_ \--he'll take it.

He'll die and give this witch bitch whatever the hell she needs if it means his pack is spared.

He won't even try to fight it.

 

**ii. together**

 

The first time Derek takes Stiles to bed, it's when Stiles is limp with exhaustion. The betas are curled up in a corner of the loft, exhausted from the full moon, and snoring softly, and every muscle in his body aches as he watches Stiles stumble through the loft, picking up his bag and Derek catches his hand. "Don't go," he mumbles, softly.

They haven't talked about the kiss, haven't talked about the way Stiles fits into the pack like he's a beta, or the way Derek never fights him when he argues.

They haven't talked about a lot. But Stiles was _here_ , coaxing the betas through the full moon, holding Erica when she was limp and whining with pain, and her claws scraped against the ground.

He'd stayed, and he was tired, and Derek--

Derek wanted him to stay.

He wanted Stiles to always stay.

"Please," he adds, hoarsely, and Stiles nods. Toes out of his shoes and follows Derek to bed, shoving off his jeans and shrugging out of his plaid before he crawls into Derek's bed, into the arms Derek opens to welcome him.

Stiles settles there, against his chest and Derek feels the last bit of tension from the long night draining away, and he tightens his grip, just a little, and whispers, "Thank you."

Stiles hums a little, presses a kiss to Derek's chest, and falls asleep, between one heartbeat and the next.

The first time Derek takes Stiles to bed, they sleep and wake next to each other when the sun is bright and high in the sky, and it's innocent, and intimate in a way that takes Derek's breath away.

 

**iii. apart**

 

"This wasn't supposed to happen," Derek whispers. There's a ringing in his ears and he keeps reaching out, stretching his sense where his bond to Stiles should be shining.

It's not, a quiet faded thing that tells him nothing, and he whines.

Peter snorts, and Derek snarls, turning on his uncle in a flash of fangs and fury. "It _wasn't_ . We had a plan, and _this_ wasn't supposed to happen! She--she wasn't supposed to go after Stiles."

Peter is staring at him, something like pity and disbelief in his eyes. "Did you really think fucking your beta would change anything? That the witch would suddenly decide Erica was the heart of this pack? Jesus, Derek, I know you're not trained to be an alpha, but use your head!"

"I was trying," Derek says, softly. His gaze flicks up to Peter. "I was _trying_ , and--"

"And it doesn't matter," Peter says, not quite cruel. "Because whatever the hell you did--you hurt him. And she _still_ took him."

Derek is quiet and Peter huffs. "We get him back. And then you sort out your misguided attempt to protect him," he says, and turns to leave.

"I didn't, you know," Derek says.

Peter pauses, and Derek clears his throat. Finishes. "Erica--I didn't fuck her."

There's a long moment, and then, "I don't think it matters. You used her to hurt him. That's what you need to fix, nephew. But first--we find him."

 


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mind the updated tags, friends. This chapter is a little dark.

**The window and the wind**

 

The witch talks to him, when she’s cutting. She tells him--her name is Lucy Wells and he thinks her name is incongruous and normal.

She tells him--she doesn’t want to hurt anyone and he thinks she has a shitty way of showing it.

She tells him--he’s best best sacrifice she’s found yet and he thinks she’s actually insane, because he’s not--he’s not. She’s wrong.

“I saved you,” she says, the third time she comes to cut. “I thought maybe I wouldn’t have to take you. I hoped. But the children weren’t enough, and the old selkie wasn’t, and I thought--maybe the heart of a wolf pack.”

“‘M not,” Stiles says, and groans as she digs the knife in.

She smiles, patient and pity shines in her eyes. “Little pup. You have no idea what you are. You're alpha hasn't told you.”

He screams as she cuts again and there is no more talk, only endless screaming.

~*~

Derek is staring, almost sightless, at the map. They've searched the entire city. The sheriff has even searched. He’d even stooped to asking Chris Argent for his help, because there was _nothing_ he wouldn’t do for Stiles.

Peter had glared at him when he said that and Boyd stormed out, too angry to speak.

He wasn’t even sure he blamed them--Stiles was missing for three _days_ before Derek realized it, and that was on him.

Whatever happened to Stiles--it was his fault.

The door slid open and Erica spills into the loft. She’s dirty, her blonde hair in a lank pony tail at the back of her neck, dirt caked under her nails. She looks like shit, and it makes a spike of worry go through him.

Then she smiles, and it’s sharp and relieved. “I found him.”

~*~

“The alpha’s heart—” Erica says, and he looks at her. Stiles is sleeping on the couch, a dark hickey on his throat, and Erica is watching him, her eyes bright and worried. “Do you—when Gerard had us, do you know what he did?”

Derek is quiet. It’s been almost two months since that night, and none of them have talked about it. Erica doesn’t crawl into his bed as often as anymore—but he still smell worry on Stiles, still smells the terror on Erica. He still watches Boyd and the way he watches Erica and Stiles both.

He is under no delusions about his beta’s loyalty—it lays solidly with Erica and, maybe more importantly, with Stiles, and Derek only in a far distant place after them.

“He talked. He could have shut up, Derek, because they weren’t interested in him. Human kid—all they wanted was to pass a message on to Scott and he knew it. But they were _torturing_ Boyd, and he just kept _talking_ , pissing them off until they finally left Boyd alone and went after Stiles.”

Derek is silent. “And then they came, and they raped me.” He flinches at that, jerking and she gives him a dark smile, nothing soft or reassuring about it. “And he still never shut up. He talked to me, the whole time. He screamed at them and told me I was strong, that he was sorry, that he’d get us out and get us safe and _keep us safe._ ” She takes a shuddery breath, and her eyes are bright with furious tears and he doesn’t know if he should take a step back or drag her into his arms. “And he _did.”_

Derek stares at her, and the summer—all of it, every fucking thing Stiles has done for him and his pack since that night—makes sense.

“Now he’s the one at risk—so tell me, _alpha._ How the fuck are we going to protect him?”  

~*~

Time is strange in the little room. He can listen to the wind whistle beyond his window for what feels like seconds, and the time it takes her to cut a single line in his skin can take hours. He thinks that enough time has passed that his pack should have found him—that they should have come for him.

Every day they don’t, she relaxes a little more.

“I don’t quite understand why your alpha wasn’t with you.”

Mine. Mine, mine _mine,_ he thinks. “’m not his,” is what he mumbles, because that’s the truth.

She snorts, and picks up a needle. The tip glows redhot and Stiles thinks—this is going to _hurt—_ before she says, softly, “Who else’s could you ever be, puppy?”

He wants to scream when that burning needle sinks into his chest—but he’s too fucking _tired._

He closes his eyes against the pain, and listens to the wind and thinks, _it’s better this way._

~*~

He calls Peter, but no one else, and only once he’s in the Camaro, hands clenched on the handle as Erica throws them around curves at a breakneck speed. She hasn’t spoken since they started driving, barely spoke in the loft, and he wonders if it’s out of fear or guilt.

He is just as silent, and decides—both.

Still. For all that he doesn’t call them, he’s not at all surprised when the betas catch up to them after less than a mile of running.

“Really, Derek. You think rescuing Stiles with _her_ is smart?”

“I think getting him out is the only goal right now. We’ll fix things later.”

Peter gives him a skeptical look and Derek bares his fangs.

As his uncle lopes after the betas, and he inhales the faded scent of Stiles in the foreign trees—Derek hopes that there is a later.

~*~

“It’s not just who the Alpha is fucking, silly boy,” she says.

“It’s not even who the alpha loves.”

He can feel his heartbeat slowing and the damn burning needle in his chest burns _hotter_ and she watches, her gaze avid and almost aroused.

“It’s who loves the pack, more than anything.”

Stiles smiles at her, a bloody rictus, as he thinks of his pack. “Stupid bitch,” he mumbles and it’s almost fond. She glares at him, and Stiles says, “My pack loves me just as much as I love them.”

She stares at him, for a moment long enough that it’s awkward and flat. Because the wind is whistling against his window and his blood is dripping into a bucket, and the needle in his chest steams slightly—but there is no one coming to rescue him.

She smiles, and touches his cheek, almost gently. “Then why did he fuck that pretty wolf, Stiles?”

~*~

She looks _different._ Steady where before she had stumbled, her hair thick and long, color bright in her cheeks.

She looks healthy and vibrant, and Stiles stares at her. She’s wearing his fucking lifeforce in the healthy growth of her goddamn hair.

He hates her for that a little. “They’ll kill you,” he says, maybe the only lucid thing he’s said all day.

“Maybe,” she says, “but not before I kill you.”

~*~

Derek smells the blood first, a split second before Erica, and a half second too late, because Erica bolts, as soon as she catches the scent, and Boyd barrels after her, already shifted. Derek can’t blame them.

The blood is fresh and under it is a thick layer of _fear_.

He slams into the warehouse a second after Erica, and a second too late.

 

**ii. interlude**

 

“Derek,” she says, and he pauses. She’s standing in the doorway to his room, and even though she sleeps here—often after her nightmares—he hesitates to invite her closer, hesitates to let any wolf in his and Stiles’ den.

“What if we lied,” she asks, and his gaze narrows.

“She’d never believe it,” Derek says.

“She would if Stiles did,” Erica answers, her chin tilted stubbornly.

And Derek shakes his head, already dismissing it. “I’m not lying to him.”

“Derek—”

“ _No._ ” Derek explodes. “I’m not—he’s not just some toy we can throw away when we’re done with it. He doesn’t get hurt by his own pack, Erica.”

She’s quiet for a long time, and then, “What if that is the only way we can keep him alive?”

 

**iii. the lincolns**

 

Stiles stands next to him, and Derek thinks—maybe. _Maybe._

Then he shifts, just enough that Derek can’t ignore it, but not so far the pack across from them would notice, and he smiles.

Derek loves Stiles’ expressions, the ones that are raw and honest and over-exaggerated, the ones that broadcast every thought and concern, when he’s glaring at the whole goddamn world.

This smile—this smile is none of those things.

This smile is the bland false smile Stiles has been offering up at pack meetings and any of the twenty alliance meetings he’s gone to, as Derek’s emissary and Second.

He’s perfectly polite, and there is literally nothing anyone—not his Alpha, not the visiting pack, not even the Hunters who swear they aren’t watching—could complain about.

But the smile is bland and lifeless and says nothing about himself or the Hale pack and Derek thinks to himself—this is going to be a very long week.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> apologies for the unexpected hiatus!!! Life and the holidays got away from me. But I'm back and we're getting closer to the end!

**truth & lies **

 

It happens fast. 

He hears Erica’s scream of fury and rage, the sharp crack of power and dull wet thud of a body. 

He hears the high panicked breathing and dripping sound, and Stiles’ heartbeat, too fast. 

He hears Boyd’s choked cry and the witch, chanting, and Peter’s whispered curse. 

Then he slams into the witch, and brings her to the ground, blood spraying as his claws rip through her pale belly and his teeth rip into her throat, and she gurgles, something high and laughing, as she dies. 

For a moment, he can’t actually comprehend that it’s over. 

That she’s dead. 

It feels anticlimactic, that she’s dead. 

And then, Stiles _screams_. 

~*~ 

Peter sleeps in Stiles room, on twisting desk chair until John finally takes pity and gives the man a sleeping bag. 

"You don't have to stay," he says, and Peter huffs. 

"Do you know what my job is, in the pack?" he asks, and John shakes his head. Peter grins. "Neither do I. But I know what his is. I know that without Stiles stubbornness, we wouldn't have a pack. And I'm not going to desert him, now. Wolves heal better and faster when they have their pack." 

"Stiles isn't a werewolf," John points out, and Peter shrugs. Like that small technicality matters not even one little bit, and he's pretty sure it's true. 

So he sleeps there, while Stiles lingers in a drug induced coma. And if he has nightmares, sleeping on the boy's floor, he doesn't bother to say. He isn't there for his own mental health well being. 

During the days, he carefully crawls into Stiles' bed and pets his hair, reading books of lore and legend to the comatose boy. 

Derek comes to the house twice, and each time, Peter curls tighter around the sleeping boy while John sends the alpha away. 

There will be hell to pay for that, later. He would care more, if Stiles was awake to care with him. 

He isn't though. 

The boy is bandaged almost head to toe, all of the runes and sigils etched into his skin carefully cleaned and slathered in antibacterial ointment and covered. He'd scar--Peter hated that. Hated that the bitch who stole him from them would leave that indelible proof of herself on his pale skin. 

He had lost too much blood, and had three broken ribs, one broken wrist, and a pentagram burnt into his abs--those were the worst of his injuries, and Peter wonders what it means about them that he is grateful that is all it is. 

He wonders and he waits, and eight days after they killed the witch and brought Stiles home--he wakes up. 

~*~ 

The witch's heart is still warm, her blood dripping from Derek's claws when Stiles screams, when Erica shrieks, and Peter's head snaps up, his eyes wide as the sigils on Stiles' skin  _ burn _ purple and bright in the dim little room. 

Erica screams, her entire body convulsing as electricity rips through her, and he curses. 

"It's backlash," he snarls, and rips the handcuffs down. "Get her," he orders, and scoops Stiles into his arms. 

"What--Peter, she's dead---" 

"Shut up," he orders, and Derek's mouth clicks shut. "Get Erica and _move_. We have to hurry." 

Derek stares at him, pale and shaking as he scoops Erica up and Peter prays they're fast enough. 

~*~ 

He watches, pushed aside as Deaton works. Erica is summarily plunged into a salt bath, and Stiles--he whines. 

Stiles is doused with oil that smells of holly and mistletoe, and Deaton chants softly, his placid expression too tight for comfort as he lights a match and drops it at Stiles feet. 

He ignites with a low _whump_ and Derek scrambles forward, only to be shoved back by Peter. "Stop," he gasps, and Peter presses him harder into the wall. "Peter, please, stop, it's _Stiles_!" 

He can barely feel the way his uncle trembles against him, can barely hear the druid chanting rising and swaying, doesn't even realize Erica comes sputtering out of the water, is only aware of  _ Stiles _ , the way he is too still, crumpled in a puddle of oil and herbs and flames, and then--

It's gone. all of it's gone. 

And Stiles is laying, unconscious, at his feet, his skin pale and bloody and covered in soot. 

"It's done," Deaton says, his voice raspy and tired, and Peter lurches away, and is violently, messily, sick. 

~*~ 

They're talking about the July full moon, when it happens. Stiles is sprawled across Derek's bed, boxers low on his hips and Derek's lips moving gentle and teasing against his belly. 

After a week of distance and coolness and heavy stares from Erica, this feels like a moment stolen, and precious and he is almost giddy with it. 

"We should do something for the full moon," Stiles says, wiggling under Derek's attention. "Peter says you used to, before." 

"Peter hated full moon nights," Derek objects, the words bumping against pale skin. "Said it was painting a target on the pack's back." 

"It doesn't have to be," Stiles objects. "It could be fun. The puppies deserve fun, don't they?" 

Derek huffs and rolls up on his elbows to peer at Stiles. His hair is a mess and his mouth is soft and curved into a smile and he looks gentle and beautiful. "What are you thinking?" 

"A bonfire. Dad will cook--"

"No," Derek snaps, and Stiles jerks, a little. Pulls back to frown. 

"But--it'd be safe, in the backyard--" 

"Stiles, the answer is  _ no _ . Drop it," he bites out, rolling out of bed.

"Derek," he protests, coming up on his knees and grabbing for his arm and Derek--

Derek  _ shakes _ him off, hard enough that Stiles flails a little, losing his balance and falling into the headboard, his head smacking against the wall. 

Derek freezes, for just a moment, and then he bolts, and Stiles is left, his head pounding and tears burning in his eyes. 

~*~ 

He sees Stiles for the first time almost two weeks after that horrible day in the warehouse and Deaton's exam room. 

It takes that long before Stiles allows him in his house, before Peter is gone long enough for Derek to approach without being snarled at. 

Stiles sits on his bed, his legs crossed, face shadowed and gaunt, and he wants to ask about what he's eating, because it's very clear Stiles isn't eating enough, but he knows it's not his right. 

He swallows that question and says, "I want to explain." 

"There's nothing to explain," Stiles says, blankly. 

"Stiles--" 

"Derek, just--please don't." 

"I  _ need _ to say this." 

Stiles tips his head to the side, his eyes narrowed and dangerously bright and so fucking beautiful it makes him want to pull the boy into his arms.

Finally Stiles nods. 

"It was never--I never touched her. She didn't--not in any way that mattered. I needed you to think that--I needed you to  _ believe _ it."

"Because if I believed it, the witch would, right?" Stiles says. "And she'd target Erica." 

Derek pauses, studying him, and Stiles smiles, brightly. "Good plan--except it's not about the Alpha's lover, Derek. It's about the heart of the pack." 

Derek stares at him, and Stiles' smile goes sharp and bitter. "Maybe if you had talked to me, or Peter, or done something other than the stupidest fucking thing--we could have avoided this." 

"Stiles, it didn't _mean_ anything." 

"But you did it," Stiles says. "You did it.  _ You _ hurt me.  _ You _ let me think you wanted her, that you  _ fucked _ her.  _ You _ let me think  _ this _ meant nothing. And I--just because it was a shitty plan, doesn't mean I can just forget." He shakes his head. "You say it didn't mean anything, but what you fucked up meant  _everything-_ and you threw it in the dirt and pissed on it."

Derek stares at him, his mouth working ineffectually. 

"You  _ needed  _ to tell me this. And you did. Now I  _ need  _ you to give me time." 

"Stiles," Derek murmurs, and Stiles twists, away from him. 

~*~ 

"What did he say?" 

Derek stops, staring at her. 

At the pack behind him, and Peter leaning against the wall, his eyes bright and knowing. 

"He sent you away, didn't he, alpha," Peter says, and it's mocking. Cutting. 

Exactly what he deserves, even if he hates Peter for it. 

Erica's breath catches in her throat. "You--you told him, though. That it wasn't real?" 

"Do you think that matters?" Peter asks, and he sounds so disdainful, Derek's shoulders curl inward. "You let him think it was. Stiles trusted you--both of you. He put this pack before himself, before his family, before his friendship with  _ Scott _ . And you shit all over that. What the fuck did you expect?" 

Derek closes his eyes and he turns away from them, from Boyd and Isaac's slightly accusing stares and Erica's panicked expression and Peter's barely banked fury. 

He turns away and he knows he shouldn't. That he should be reassuring them and reminding them that even with Stiles distance--they're still pack. 

He doesn't do that. 

He turns away and when Erica says, "Derek," he shakes his head and says, simply. "Get out. All of you." 

There's a low whine from one of them--Isaac, he thinks--but none of them actually fight him. 

He stares out the window and listens as they leave, and then stands alone in the home Stiles created for them, and wonders how the fuck he managed to screw it all up so fast.

 

**ii. before**

 

Stiles is noisy, always. His mouth runs even when he's sleeping, mumbling nonsense into his pillow that Derek smiles to hear. 

The only time Derek has found that Stiles will go quiet is when he's like this. 

When Stiles is pressed into the sheets and Derek is draped over him, teeth pressing into the soft give of Stiles' skin--then, Stiles' mouth hang open and his eyes go dazed and sightless, and he shudders under Derek's touch, hips rolling back into every thrust, soundless in his absolute pleasure. 

He's beautiful, and Derek wants, absurdly, to keep him forever. 

He presses his mouth to Stiles skin, nips at his skin to push the question, the plea down, and angles his hips just right to hit Stiles' prostate on his next thrust, smirking against his neck when Stiles shifts, scrambling frantic under him, a soundless scream in his throat as his eyes squeeze shut. 

It's beautiful and Derek does it again, again and again and again, until Stiles is almost sobbing with pleasure and he's dripping sweat all over the younger boy, coating him in Derek's scent and his orgasm tightens his balls and licks up his spine and he groans, "Come, baby. Come on, come on,  _ come _ ." 

Stiles comes beautifully, a shudder, his whole body going tense and still and a low whine finally breaking his silence, and Derek spills in him, groaning as he does and Stiles pushes back, wordlessly begging for more as Derek fucks him through his orgasm, shoving deeper and finally stilling there, his come making Stiles even wetter and filthy and perfect. 

When he falls to the side, he's gasping and Stiles is smiling, spilling over his chest and burrowing there while Derek rubs come into his skin. 

"Can we have this, forever," Stiles asks, sleepily, and Derek's heart stops. 

He wants that. 

He wants it so bad it makes him shake. Stiles' fingers are gentle and soothing as they tilt Derek down to him, kisses him gentle. 

"Yeah," Derek breathes. 

 

**iii. interlude**

 

She watches. 

Before, when she was just a sick girl in the hallways, a joke for the school--she watched him. 

And after, when he was not quite an enemy, and still a protective ally--she watched him. 

She watched him in the basement, until she couldn't keep her eyes open and a new nightmare ripped into her, and she knew he watched her. Helpless and furious, he kept his gaze steady on her. 

And now--now as he falls into their alpha's pack, and bullies them into a pack, as he wakes screaming and smiles as he cooks their breakfast, as he trains in the forest and coaxes them to do the same--she watches him. 

And she wonders just how far she would go to keep him safe.  


	12. Chapter 12

 

**Broken Things**

 

He doesn’t know when he started trusting Peter.

Maybe the same time he stopped trusting Derek.

He just knows he did--that the older beta will always tell him the truth, and always protect him.

Stiles doesn’t ask him many questions--the truth isn’t something he’s particularly interested in. And he doesn’t acknowledge that what Peter protects him from most, is Derek.

~*~

He loses track of time.

Isaac says he was with the witch for almost a week. His cast is still on his wrist when the school year resumes, and his ribs ache enough that he doesn’t even think about lacrosse.

Sitting across from him at lunch, Boyd asks, “Are we worth it?”

Stiles doesn’t answer, mouth full of chicken nuggets.

It’s an excuse and they both know it, but Boyd doesn’t press.

~*~

He goes to pack meetings.

Peter stops him, the first time, eyes narrowed with concern. “You don’t have to do this,” he says gently and Stiles tugs at his shirt.

“I’m pack, aren’t I? Pack goes to meetings.”

Peter doesn’t argue, just carefully escorts him to the loft, and sits close to him as Derek talks and Erica proposes a movie, and Stiles shakes his head and backs away.

When they’ve returned to his house, and Peter has him wrapped in blankets on the couch, a new episode Criminal Minds droning in the background, Peter says, “Can you forgive him?”

Stiles shakes his head and shrugs, a non-committal move. “I want to.”

Peter’s silent and Stiles twists to look at him. “Do you think i should?”

“I think,” he says, carefully, “that distrust and hurt can become hate very easily--and hate destroys packs and people.”

“I don’t hate him,” Stiles says. “There’s a twisted part of me that even understands _why_ they did it. I just--”

“It hurts,” Peter says and Stiles nods.

“All I see is the way they looked, that day. The way he’d touch her,” he bites his lip and shakes his head. “I’m trying. I just--I don’t know how to get past that.”

~*~

He misses Derek.

It _hurts_ to think about the alpha, _hurts_ to even see him--but he misses him too.

Isaac and Boyd stay close to him, Peter has become his own personal shadow, and Lydia watches him with sharp, hurt eyes.

Erica doesn’t.

Erica stays away, doesn’t sit with them at lunch or in class, doesn’t approach him at all and the few times Stiles seeks her out, she looks almost _scared._

And he sees Derek, at pack nights, and training sessions, and when they tramp through the preserve on a full moon.

He sees him--but it’s different.

There’s a space between them, a hesitance in Derek that makes sense.

But it hurts.

He didn’t expect it to still hurt.

~*~

Boyd has just passed him a hot dog when the gate creaks, and Stiles turns, a grin wide and ready and going startled and still, when he sees-- “Derek,” he croaks.

Isaac is pressed into his side, and he isn’t sure when exactly the beta moved, but he wraps an arm around his shoulders absently, tucking him into Stiles throat and studying the alpha. “I didn’t think you’d come.”

Derek hesitates, his gaze flicking over his pack and the fire, and the sheriff--and coming back, always, to Stiles. “I can go,” he offers.

He can _see_ it, still, Derek sweaty and half dressed as he emerges from his room, overlaid over the quiet, hesitant alpha standing in front of him.

He blinks, and says, “No. Stay. Come on, Peter, get Derek a hot dog.”

~*~

Stiles isn’t surprised, when he finds Derek in his bedroom.

He knew, when the mountain ash came down, when he texted Derek about the pack dinner--he knew that this would happen.

Derek is staring at him, and there’s blatant hunger and hope in his eyes, a look as familiar as finding Derek in his bedroom.

He huffs, and let’s the door swing shut behind him, reaching for a pair of sleep pants. His side aches, and Derek is watching him, and he can’t be bothered to wait for the alpha to leave.

It’s nothing, Stiles thinks, bitterly, that he hasn’t seen before.

Derek is quiet as Stiles changes, making a tiny, almost inaudible gasp when his shirt comes off and all the fresh pink scars from the witch are displayed. He looks like he wants to say something, but he looks like he has no idea what to say.

“What can I help you with, Derek?” Stiles asks, finally, and the alpha stirs.

“Tonight. What was that?”

Stiles pauses and looks at him. “It was your pack, acting like a pack. We haven’t done that in a while--seemed like we should.”

“Are you--”

“I’m tired,” Stiles says, sharply. “That’s what I am.”

Derek watches him, gaze burning as Stiles crawls in bed. He turns his back to Derek and stubbornly closes his eyes, like he can _will_ the other man away.

“Stiles,” Derek whispers, his voice raw and open and _aching_.

“I can’t do this,” Stiles says, softly. "I can’t--I can be your beta. I can be pack. But that’s all I can give you, Derek.”

“For how long?” Derek chokes and Stiles doesn’t answer.

He doesn’t know how to say, _forever._

~*~

Boyd watches Erica as they walk through the halls. Isaac is talking to Stiles, and the Heart--Boyd knows none of them are calling him that, but he also knows exactly what Stiles is to their pack--is listening absently, flipping through a folder until he crows, triumphantly, and shoves his notes at Isaac.

Boyd steers his packmates toward history, and watches Erica.

She moves like a ghost, head down and eyes on the ground, and he wishes he knew how to fix everything they broke.

~*~

“Is it hard?” Lydia asks. Stiles looks at her. She isn’t pack, not really--but she could be.

She will be.

Still--she didn’t survive the summer with them, and it’s hard to trust her, completely.

“What?”

She nods at Derek, where he’s sparring with Jackson. “Being around him, again.”

The clearing goes still, and Derek’s eyes flick to him, wide and a little lost.

“Yes,” Stiles says, holding his gaze. The alpha doesn’t flinch, but Stiles thinks it’s only because his entire pack is around them.

“Then why--”

“Because I love the pack,” he says, simply, turning his gaze back to her. “And I trust Derek.”

“ _How?”_

Stiles shrugs. “He’s a good alpha. I might not trust Derek not to break my heart--obviously--but I trust that he’s always going to try to do what the pack needs.”

Derek makes an abortive half-step toward Stiles, and then he shakes his head, and almost bolts away from the pack.

~*~

Derek likes to draw on Stiles back, when they’re laying in bed. He licks the sweat away presses a kiss to the wing of Stiles’ shoulder.

“What happens when we go to college?”

Derek likes to draw on Stiles back, tracing constellations in his freckles and mole.

Stiles likes to dream.

“You’ll go. Maybe not all of you. Isaac will stay close--he needs the pack more than he needs to stretch his wings--but some of you will go. And you’ll learn and you’ll make allies.”

Stiles rolls his head and smiles at Derek, pressed against the pillow, one eye shining. “And then what?”

Derek smiles. “And then you come home. Back to me. We move into a new house I build for the pack, out in the preserve. Have the pack over every weekend and for full moons. You work for your dad and I start teaching. And a few years down the road, when we’re settled--we adopt a couple kids, ones that need it, not just a baby. And we give them a family.”

Stiles smiles, and it’s so brilliant and _happy_ , so hungry for the future they’re painting, that Derek can’t help but lean in and kiss him, just to taste that joy.

 

**ii. After**

“Stiles needs to stay here,” Derek says, carefully.

Peter laughs and Stiles glances at him. It’s the first time since _before_ that Derek has even suggested it.

“Peter,” he starts.

“No,” Peter says. “Absolutely not.”

Derek growls, a low threatening noise and Stiles stands.

“You really didn’t learn anything, did you?” he asks. “You can’t--Derek, we’re a _pack._ But you making decisions for all of us--it’s not good. It doesn’t _fix_ anything. Last time you did that, we ended up here. Broken.”

Derek bites his lip, clearly hesitating on what to say to that and Stiles huffs. “I’ll stay. Because we’re _all_ staying. This isn’t a me and you thing, and it’s not a protecting me thing--it’s providing a united front. Got it,” he demands, gaze flicking over the pack. He falters on Erica, but doesn’t say anything.

“We don’t know what they want,” Stiles says.

“And until we do,” Derek snaps, turning away. “We’re staying here and together. We can apologize later if they just came for friendship bracelets.”

~*~

Stiles is at the counter when Derek steps into the kitchen, and he tenses a little, leaning away from the alpha.

“Do you think we’re ever going to stop doing that,” Derek asks.

For a moment, he thinks about pretending he doesn’t know what Derek is talking about--just for a moment. “I don’t know,” he says, honestly. “I want to be comfortable around you, Derek. But sometimes--all I can see is the man I loved.” He smiles, his heart pounding. “And other times, all I can see is that fucking hickey and how much you hurt me.”

He stands up and Derek doesn’t stop him, doesn’t say anything as Stiles leaves the kitchen.

  


**iii. Before**

Stiles sleeps the way he does everything else.

With a kind of endless energy, moving in his sleep, noisy even when dreaming, and after two nights spent in bed, and a bruise to show for it that faded while Derek had his first cup of coffee, he realized how to sleep with Stiles without coming of it looking like he’d gone twelve rounds in the ring.

He wrapped Stiles up in his arms and a blanket and held him close and immobile.

What surprised him was--Stiles _let_ him.

He tipped his head back, and breathed a soft little sigh, and slept like that, pliant and trusting in Derek’s grip and Derek held him and thought--

He’d kill to keep this boy safe.

He’d kill anyone who hurt him.

He slept, wrapped around Stiles, and basking in that knowledge.

~*~

The first night he slept in the tree outside Stiles window, listening to his boy sob and thrash on the bed--Derek wondered if he was right.

If he shouldn’t kill anyone who hurt Stiles.

And if he was the one who did--what then?


	13. Chapter 13

**i. Strangers in a Familiar Land**

 

“I don’t  _ like _ it,” Stiles says. Isaac, always sensitive to Stiles’ mood, shifts and presses against his shins, and Stiles reaches down to pet his hair. 

“It's not unusual, for packs to visit a new Alpha,” Peter interjects. 

“Every time someone comes to visit Beacon Hills, half of us almost die,” Stiles grumbles. 

Peter inclines his head, conceding the point. 

“They’re coming under a white flag,” Derek says, patiently and a frission of tension goes through Stiles. Isaac presses heavily into him, and Stiles relaxes again. 

It’s not  _ easier _ , really. It’s been six months, since the witch, since Erica and Derek’s lie was revealed, since Derek begged Stiles to take him back. 

Six months and it’s not  _ easier.  _ But it’s habit. Forcing himself to relax, to accept the pain that is Derek’s constant presence, to just  _ deal with it. _

He does. 

For the pack. 

“Do we trust them?” he asks, the question none of them  _ have _ asked. Derek sighs and shakes his head. 

“But we don’t have any choice but to meet with them.” 

~*~ 

The pack is--

Not what he expects. The Alpha is a few years older than Derek, but noticeably younger than Peter, with a wide, innocent grin that makes Stiles think--they’ve never bled. 

They’re  _ innocent.  _

The betas he brings--five, all younger than him,  all loose and grinning, compared to the Hale betas, standing tense and wary and blank-faced. 

Stiles shifts, leaning into Derek. He’s a long line of heat and strength, and he trembles a little as Stiles presses against him, steadies him. 

“Welcome to the Hale territory,” Derek says, and Stiles smiles. 

It almost feels real. 

~*~ 

He waits until he hears silence settle over the house. It feels thick and waiting, like a held breath, and with a sigh, he crawls out of bed to find Derek. 

It would be so much easier, he thinks, if he could hate Derek. 

If he could walk away completely. 

Peter offered, once, to leave the pack. He knew what the offer really was--to become alpha again. To form a new pack. 

Stiles said no, and it was never mentioned again. Just like the bite Peter offered. 

He wonders sometimes, about Peter. 

Derek is in the kitchen sitting over a cup of hot chocolate and Stiles sits next to him. 

This. He thinks this, the way it isn't  _ easy _ anymore, to be with him, is what he misses the most. 

“Mom used to host other packs all the time,” he murmurs, as Stiles reaches out and takes the hot chocolate. “It was so easy. There was never anyone trying to kill us. We didn't even think to be afraid of it.” 

He laughs bitterly, and closes his eyes. “When I was fourteen, I watched hunters kill an omega who'd come to us for sanctuary and that was when I really  _ realized.  _ Life is blood and death.” 

“It doesn't have to be,” Stiles says softly. “Those kids--they're proof that we can live in peace.” 

Derek looks at him, then, hope and yearning in familiar eyes, “Is that what you want?” 

Stiles shrugs and finishes the hot chocolate. “I don't know what I want.”

~*~

The packs run together on the full moon. 

Stiles stands in the preserve, and listens to the familiar sound of his wolves howling, the sound of the Morgan pack running, and thinks, he would do anything, suffer anything, to keep this. 

He wishes he could keep Derek, too. 

Stiles never  _ says _ that. He keeps it tucked down deep, where he can barely acknowledge it, and never ever says it. Even still, he thinks they know--Peter and his dad, and maybe even Derek. 

But it doesn’t  _ change  _ anything. 

The fact that he can be in the same room with Derek, now. The fact that he doesn’t want to gouge out Erica’s eyes, when she looks at him. The fact that sometimes, when they’re sitting in the living room, the pack scattered around and a movie playing, Stiles lets himself lean into Derek’s solid warmth, not for other people who might be watching, but because he  _ wants  _ it. Wants  _ this.  _

He closes his eyes as the wolves howl and push aside the things he wants and cannot have. 

~*~ 

Derek and Marc Morgan come back, and the betas stream in around them. Stiles smiles from his place on the porch, where he’s curled around a book and a cup of hot chocolate. He doesn’t flinch away from Derek, when the alpha dips down and rubs against him, blatantly scent marking, just tilts his head to bare his neck for the alpha and rubs his hand over Derek’s shoulder before he pulls away. 

He makes a face as he sits up, pushing aside his blanket. “You’re sweaty.” 

Derek snorts, and Stiles grins at the Morgan alpha. “Are you hungry? I cooked.” 

The alpha smiles, and he heads inside, shouting for Isaac. Morgan glances at Derek. “He’s very good, your mate.” 

Derek is watching Stiles, and he sees the way his steps hitch and stutter, like he’s been startled, and he wants to go to him. Wants to explain this. 

He doesn’t. He just nods, and smiles, a small, private thing. “I know.” 

 

**ii. After**

 

Erica is in his bedroom. 

She’s in a loose sweater and jeans that aren’t painted on and her eyes are ringed in black, but he thinks it’s shadows and exhaustion more than eyeliner. 

Her hair is lank and tugged into a messy pony tail, and he realizes she looks as bad as she did, right after Gerard’s basement. 

He  _ hates _ that he cares. 

“You aren’t supposed to be here,” he says, instead of addressing how infuriating finding her in his room is. 

“When are you going to forgive him?” 

Stiles freezes in the process of kicking off his shoes, and stares at her, his expression twisted in disbelief. “Are you serious right now?”

“It’s been six  _ months,”  _ she persists. “You have to--”

“ _ I _ don’t have to do shit. And what I choose to do with Derek--that’s my business. Not yours. My relationship was  _ never _ your business, and it’s when you forgot that little fact that everything got fucked up.” 

She flushes, but her expression is still mutinous, still determined that she’s right. 

“He loves you,” she says,  and he laughs. 

“You say that like it matters. Does he know you’re here?” 

“Stiles--” 

He curses and snatches up his phone, dialing quickly. 

“ _ Stiles? What’s wrong?”  _ Derek asks, alert and tinged with worry. 

“Did you know she was coming here? To talk to me about forgiving you?” 

_ “Fuck,”  _ he whispers and Stiles smiles tightly, ignoring the relieved swoop of his stomach. 

“Get the hell out,” he snaps at Erica. “And stay the hell outta my relationships.” He redirects his attention to the phone. “Control your puppy, Derek.” 

Erica stares at him a moment and then nods, and slips out. 

 

**iii. Before**

 

Derek is not a good alpha. He knows it, and he  _ wants  _ to be better. He thinks about that morning, right after he got the betas back, because  _ Stiles _ brought them to him, and he thinks about the furious, demanding glare over the kitchen table, the way the fragile bruised human had demanded Derek do  _ better. _

He thinks about, too, the way that Stiles had helped him. 

~*~ 

He takes Stiles to the vault. Peter comes the first time, but only the first time. After that, Stiles and Derek come alone, and Stiles leans against his knees while Derek props himself against the wall, and they read together, sometimes breaking the silence with tidbits of information, when Stiles will ask questions, and Derek will murmur memories about his mother. 

He thinks it’s the strangest way, to become a good alpha. 

And he thinks it’s not all there is too it. There’s the endless training and the long nights of pack bonding that Stiles bullies them into, and the quiet conversations with Boyd and Isaac, the cuddling with Erica after nightmares, even learning to trust Peter. 

There’s a lot, to being alpha. 

But it’s in that vault, with his family’s history and lore and legends around them, talking about dreams and hierarchy and pack dynamics that he realizes what kind of alpha he wants to be. 

It’s there, that he realizes he wants to be the kind of alpha Stiles is proud of. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the spotty updating. I've got a lot of real life stuff going on and I'm sorting through, but writing is...slow. Bear with me, I promise I'll get us there. <3


	14. Chapter 14

**i. outsiders**

 

The Morgan pack comes calling in November, when the weather turns and Derek moves from the loft that Stiles had helped him shape into a home, into a small house in the middle of the preserve.

They come in small numbers, just the second and emissary, with a gift for the new Hale Alpha and a request to create a formal alliance.

“It's not unusual,” Peter says, patient with Stiles as he fidgets anxiously. Derek is quiet, giving the human a chance to sort through his misgivings.

“It's unusual for us to host someone who isn't looking to kill us,” Stiles says and Peter inclines his head, granting that point.

“You don't know what it's like to live in a pack at peace,” he says and Stiles bites his lip.

He doesn't know.

He isn't sure any of them are, anymore. The boys who grew up under the Hale's golden summer of peace and prosperity were burned away by Argent fire.

But--

“Fine. Fine, if this what you want,” he says, tiredly, and nods at Derek.

What the hell, he thinks, exhausted. The worst already happened.

~*~

He turns that word over in his mind, through the rest of the full moon revelry, turns it like a dirty penny he's trying to rub clean.

He knows what mate means, to a wolf.

He knows because he spent so many days and nights, tucked against Derek reading myth and lore, eating up every but of information about werewolves and packs that he could.

At first, he thought it was a way to stay alive. Then it was fascinating. And then it was _his_ pack and everything he learned let him help them.

Mates though.

He'd thought it. Flirted with the idea of it, in the night while Derek slept next to him.

He'd never _said_ it, and Derek didn't either and then Erica walked out of that bedroom and mates became a broken piece of a dream Derek threw away.

But sitting in the house, Morgan wolves milling with Hales--Stiles thinks maybe he was wrong.

Maybe he can still have that.

~*~

Stiles won’t talk about Derek to the betas.

He feels like half of a divorced couple, sharing kids and trying not to bad mouth their father.

But it’s not even that.

It’s that he doesn’t want to bad mouth Derek.

Derek isn’t perfect, not even close to it, but he’s the Alpha, and he’s _trying_ , trying so damn hard that sometimes it makes Stiles hurt to watch.

He remembers when Derek was a scared boy trying to be something he was never meant to be, turning kids he saw shades of himself in, building a family and realizing, abrupt and too late, that he should have been building an army.

He remembers the fear in Derek’s voice when he called about the betas, remembers the way he’d stared at them hungrily when Stiles let Derek into his kitchen.

The pack is almost unrecognizable now—not fractured and broken and cutting at each other.

They were a family now, despite everything, and Stiles—

He misses his family.

~*~

He curls on the couch next to his dad the night before the Morgans get to town and sighs.

John hides his smile, and tugs the boy in, letting Stiles nestle and burrow until he’s finally still, fingers the only thing still moving, restless in the hem of his tshirt.

“Should I forgive him?” Stiles asks, sooner than John expects, and not quite what he expects.

“Do you?”

Stiles tenses, and John’s thumb rubs over the fading scar on his arm, where the witch carved her spell. “Not always. But some days—some days I can.”

“And the other days?”

Stiles shudders. “The other days I want to hit him for being so stupid and rip Erica’s eyes out for even looking at him,” he breathes in a rush, a confession he hasn’t made to anyone, not even Peter or his dad.

It feels good, to have it said.

And his gut churns with it and guilt, too.

“Stiles, what you have to consider is—what can you live with. And what can’t you live without. Figure that out and you’ll figure out what to do about Derek.”

Stiles huffs. “Can’t you just tell me?”

John laughs, and kisses his hair, and holds his son because Stiles might be the heart of Derek’s pack—but he was John’s first and always.

~*~

“The stories don’t talk about you,” the beta says.

Stiles slides a glance at her. Cahrin, the youngest of Morgan’s betas, a born wolf from the eastern seaboard who moved to join her cousin when he became an alpha.

“What do they say?” Stiles asks, curiously.

She bites her lip and glances to where the alphas are drinking and absorbed in conversation.

“That the surviving Hales can’t be killed. That hunters have tried and they brush off grave dust. That you kill monsters—but not werewolves. That a screaming lady walks with your pack, and a emissary that makes witches run.”

Stiles’ lips twist at that, and Peter twitches toward them just for a moment before Stiles shakes his head, dismisses him that easily. Cahrin watches, curiously.

“But they don’t talk about the Alpha’s mate. Why is that?”

Stiles shrugs and puts the last plate of ribs on the table. “Maybe because that’s not how things are between Derek and me.”

_That_ draws another wolf to them, his face creased in a frown.

Tomas, Marc’s brother. He was flirting with Isaac earlier, and Stiles eyes him warily, wondering if he’s good enough for the beta.

Wondering if he can handle Isaac’s sass.

“You—Derek is your mate, and your alpha. But you aren’t with him?”

He isn’t sure why he says it.

Maybe it’s because he can feel the subtle accusation in Tomas’ voice and Erica’s eyes on him and Derek’s endless fucking patience.

Maybe it’s because he doesn’t feel guilty for _not_ being with the man who hurt him.

“Derek broke my heart,” Stiles says, coldly. “And he says he did it to protect me—but he broke my fucking heart and I—I _can’t.”_

There’s a moment, an endless silence and Derek’s eyes, sad, sad, sad—and then

“You’re lying,” Marc says, soft voice breaking the silence.

~*~

He’s sitting on the porch, his legs drawn up and crossed under him when Derek comes up to the house.

Derek is quiet, watching Stiles for a long time as the crickets chirp and the night deepens.

“You broke my heart,” Stiles says, because that’s the heart of it, isn’t it. “She was killing me, and you know what I remember thinking? Good. Good, he’ll be happier without me in the way.”

Derek makes a quiet, pained noise, and Stiles’ flicks a look at him.

“I meant it—I _wanted_ to die, because it meant you’d be happier.”

“ _Stiles,”_ Derek breathes.

“I don’t ever want to feel like that,” Stiles says, soft and plaintive. “I _hate_ feeling like that. I _hate_ how much power you have over me.”

“Tell me how to fix it,” Derek says, begs, coaxes, the same thing he’s been saying for months.

Stiles doesn’t answer. He isn’t sure there is a way for Derek to fix this.

“I can’t keep doing this,” Stiles murmurs.

Derek watches him and his voice shakes when he asks, softly, "What do you want to do?" 

 

ii.  **before**

 

The first time Derek kisses Stiles, they’re covered in glitter, and Erica is laughing as Boyd and Isaac ride some spinny thing.

He can see them, over Derek’s shoulder, his pack laughing and happy and whole, and he smiled, his lips stretched in a sticky grin, and Derek kissed him.

In the middle of the flashing lights and glitter falling from the disco ball and Peter lingering too close, Derek kissed him. Wrapped an arm around Stiles waist, drew him in, pressed him close and licked into his mouth, bit at his lip, until Stiles mewled, helpless and small, and Derek smiled, bright and smug.

The kiss tasted like curly fries and cherry coke and cotton candy, like sweat and a hint of blood when Derek’s teeth sharpened.

Stiles thought, dazed as Derek pulled away, that he wanted to kiss Derek every day for the rest of their lives.

 

**iii. apart**

 

The thing is—he isn’t what she wants.

He knows she’s focusing on the wrong person.

That Erica is who Derek loves. And that _hurts_ , hurts more even than the witch’s knife, slicing too deep, carving and cutting and he closes his eyes and—lets it happen.

Keeps his mouth pressed closed, eyes closed and a smile on his lips.

She doesn’t know.

She doesn’t know that he isn’t the one Derek loves. That he isn’t the Alpha’s heart.

And maybe, he thinks, grunting as she cuts him, drifting on the pain of it, maybe that’s better.

He’ll be gone, and Derek will be happy, and soon.

Soon it won’t hurt anymore.

He keeps his mouth shuts and endures, takes all of the pain and her out of tune humming, because it’s what his pack _needs._  


	15. Chapter 15

**i. the end of things**

 

The pack goes camping for spring break.

There is already talk about the summer--Isaac wants to travel with Allison and Chris, and Stiles isn’t sure how that happened, his pup falling in with the hunter princess, but he also doesn’t want to know.

Boyd will travel with Peter, to solidify alliances with nearby packs, and follow a rumor in South America of a she-wolf who answers to Hale.

“What about you?” Lydia asks, leaning into Jackson, and giving Stiles the sphinx smile she’s so good at.

Stiles shrugs, and Erica says, softly, “I’m going to spend the summer with Marc’s pack.”

~*~

“Will you hate me?” he asks, and slides a look at Peter, cautious and sidelong.

The relationship has changed—shifted, and grown and somewhere in the aftermath of Gerard’s basement and the witch who ripped him open and Derek’s betrayal, Peter became one of his best friends.

“You spend so much time taking care of this pack, Stiles,” Peter says, softly. “And I would throw it away and walk away from him, if that’s what you wanted. I would kill an alpha and build a pack for you. But that’s never been what you wanted.”

Stiles stares at him. Peter sighs and comes to stand in front of the boy. He runs a hand careful over Stiles hair and the boy tips his head a little, leaning into the touch and offering his throat to be scent-marked.

Peter hides his smile and says, gently, “You are the heart of the pack, pup. And if you need this—if you _want_ it—it is yours to take. No one will hate you, for choosing what will make you happy.”

Stiles blinks at him, eyes wide and worried. “But will it?”

Peter shrugs, enigmatic.

~*~

They never dated.

Stiles taught him how to be a better alpha, bullied him and pushed, poked and prodded until Derek did _better_ , forced them into being a pack—and they fell into each other, inevitable like stars tugged into orbit around each other.

But they never did things like coffee and dinner, didn’t do anything beyond arguing about the pack and dreaming about the future and fucking anytime the pups were gone.

Sometimes, that lack of normality is what he regrets the most.

~*~

Erica leaves on an early Monday morning in May.

She goes without saying anything to the pack. She stops by the Hale house, the new one, the one Derek built for them, and he looks at her, eyes bright and sad. “You don’t have to go,” he says and she smiles.

“I do,” she says, simply. “I’m not an omega—but only because you won’t let me be. The pack belongs to Stiles—and I owe him too much to stay when I’m hurting him.”

Derek doesn’t argue.

He can’t—she isn’t wrong.

“I don’t regret it,” she says. “I don’t regret anything that could protect him.”

“We didn’t protect him,” Derek reminds her. “We hurt him and it didn’t even work.”

“But we did it with good intentions,” Erica insists, and Derek sighs.

She smiles at him, her eyes sad, and dimmer than they were, when he changed her. “Take care of him, Alpha.”

He watches where she vanishes down the drive until he can no longer hear her heartbeat.

~*~

They go to dinner.

It’s…strange.

Awkward and tense—too much history sitting between them to ignore, to start over.

They’re dancing around an elephant in the room, and halfway through their salads, Stiles drops his fork. “This isn’t going to work.”

Derek is tense, and silent, and Stiles shakes his head. “I can’t—Derek, _this_ isn’t going to work.”

~*~

Derek’s mouth under his tastes like Caesar salad and the sugar sweet of candy that Derek never admits he’s addicted to, tastes like coming home, and Stiles wiggles in his lap, squirms closer as Derek pants into his throat, nips at the skin and presses a half-hearted protest there. “We have to _talk_ ,” Derek insists, “I don’t—we have to do it right this time.”

Stiles drags his head up, glares at Derek. “Don’t ever lie to me,” Stiles snarls, and Derek nods. Swallows.

“Never, sweetheart.”

Stiles smiles, and leans in to kiss him again, and it isn’t hard and desperate, it’s liquid hot slow, and Derek groans,  cants his hips up, grinding into Stiles.

They’ll work everything out, later.

~*~

It isn’t easy.

There are days where Stiles snaps and snarls, retreats from Derek’s touches and uses words like barbs. Days he positions the pack around him so Derek can’t get close.

There are days when the hurt is still raw and real.

“It’s normal,” Derek says, and Peter gives him a patient look. “Stiles might be forgiving me, but he hasn’t forgotten.”

“He never will,” Peter warns him.

“But one day, he might realize he can trust me again.”

It’s enough, Derek thinks, to rebuild on.

 

**ii. interlude**

 

She sits on the roof, and listens to his heartbeat.

She listened to it, once before, listened to it pound familiar and steady as hunters ripped at her clothes and he never faltered.

He came back for them.

He came back for them when even their alpha didn’t.

She swore, in the living room downstairs, that first night, that she would do anything to protect him and make him happy and she had.

It had devastated him, almost destroyed him.

But this—leaving.

She can do this.

“Bye, batman,” she murmurs, and slips away into the night.

 

**iii. before**

 

Stiles _hurt._ His face throbbed and Boyd was pressing into the bruises Gerard had kicked into his ribs. He hurt and he couldn’t inhale without a sharp piercing pain, and he wonders, not for the first time, if he shouldn’t have take Peter’s offer, to take the bite.

It sits wrong, still.

Just like it had that night, when it was first offered.

Peter shouldn’t be his alpha.

He pets Erica’s hair as she whimpers, and whispers, “I’m going to give you the pack you deserve if it kills me. Gonna give it to both of you, and Derek too.”

He flicked a gaze beyond the window where he knew Derek was waiting in the dark, respecting the orders to stay away until morning.

“We have to do better, Derek. I don’t care how—we’re going to build a pack.”

There was no response. But there didn’t need to be one.

 

**iv. future**

 

Stiles leans into Derek, and smiles as the Morgan pack approaches, his gaze skating over the blonde werewolf at Marc’s side. Derek’s arm tightens around his waist and Stiles leans into him.

“Alpha Morgan,” Derek greets. “Welcome back to our territory.”

Marc inclines his head and smiles. “Alpha Hale. You and your mate honor us. We look forward to running with you under the full moon.”

Stiles snorts and Marc’s grin goes teasing, and behind them, his pack begins to howl.


End file.
